The Philippines’ Health Department says it will no longer allow local governments to announce which brand of coronavirus vaccines will be available at inoculation sites.
The move comes after hundreds of people this week lined up at a site in Manila when they found out the Pfizer vaccine would be given out there.
“What we’re going to enforce now is brand agnostic,” Undersecretary Myrna Cabotaje told CNN Philippines’ The Source.
From now on, only people already in line at a vaccination site will be told which shot they’ll get and “if they do not like the vaccines that are given during that time, then they go to the end of the line,” Cabotaje said.
On Tuesday, residents lined up outside of the Manila Prince Hotel as early as 2 a.m. for a chance to get one of the 900 Pfizer jabs that the local government announced could be given to walk-ins, reports Rappler.com.
Manila Mayor Isko Moreno told CNN Philippines that the preference for the Pfizer vaccine may have been why people chose that specific site out of the nearly 20 in the city.
