P61 billion allotted for booster shots in 2022 budget

MANILA, Philippines, November 10 ------ Some P61.6 billion has been allocated in next year’s proposed national budget for the procurement of vaccine booster shots, based on the Senate version of the 2022 budget program that has the health sector having the third biggest share of allocation. The P45.3-billion portion of the amount – listed as unprogrammed funds – will provide one-dose protection to some 83.4 million Filipinos at an estimated cost of P544 per jab.

The People’s Budget Coalition (PBC), an umbrella group of business and civil society organizations, meanwhile, has asked lawmakers to redirect about 17 percent, or P841.68 billion, of the proposed P5.024-trillion budget for next year to COVID-19 programs. In the Senate version of the budget, the Department of Health (DOH) is given additional funding of P16.245 billion under the Family Health, Immunization, Nutrition and Responsible Parenting provision that seeks to provide protection for 29.86 million Filipinos at the same cost per injection.

Some P896.4 million is also allocated for the construction of warehouses for the storage of vaccines while P2.48 billion is set aside for the hiring of more vaccinators. Sen. Sonny Angara, who chairs the Senate finance committee that drafted its version of the budget, said the health sector got at least P100 billion to P150 billion more to strengthen the country’s pandemic response as the National Expenditure Program (NEP) submitted by Malacañang to Congress last August sorely lacked provisions to address the effects of the lingering crisis.

“It’s really a health budget with massive amounts we moved to the DOH and PhilHealth (Philippine Health Insurance Corp.)…that’s (P100 billion) like a complete budget for several agencies,” Angara told reporters at an online press conference hours before he sponsored the committee report on the NEP. The Department of Education (DepEd), state universities and colleges (SUCs) and the rest of the education sector remain as the top taker of the proposed budget with P738.6 billion, followed by the Department of Public Works and Highways which is allocated with P665.5 billion.

The health sector – including the DOH, PhilHealth and government specialty hospitals – will be getting P312.3 billion. “Based on our experience last year – I hope to God, that we don’t have – in case there’ll be a new variant (of COVID-19),” Angara said. The senator listed the appropriations given by the committee to the health sector, including P51 billion for benefits and compensation for private and public health workers fighting the pandemic. This is on top of the P11 billion for the special risk allowance for health workers.

Angara stressed that other realignments were made to other agencies like the DepEd and the Commission on Higher Education as well as SUCs to prepare them for face-to-face classes. He said budgets for the Medical Scholarship Law and the Genomic and Research Center was increased while funding for the Virology Institute was given a boost of over P1 billion.

Source: philstar.com