Health personnel in Sarangani will prioritize the elderly or senior citizens for the initial rollout in the coming days of the province’s first batch of the Pfizer coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) vaccine.

Maria Razel Bustria, the immunization coordinator of the Provincial Health Office (PHO), said Thursday they are targeting to cover some 2,340 senior citizens or those under the A2 priority group for the expanded vaccination.

She said they received on September 28 an initial 780 vials or 4,680 doses of the Pfizer vaccine from the Department of Health-Region 12 (Soccsksargen).

The delivery of the vaccines to the cold chain facility at the PHO-Provincial DOH Office building in Alabel town came after the provincial government gained approval for the use of its newly acquired ultralow freezer (ULF) unit.

Bustria said based on their projection, the available Pfizer doses can accommodate a total of 2,340 individuals at two doses each which will be administered with an interval of 21 days.

Based on the national government’s advisory, she said the vaccines may be given to individuals under priority groups A1 (frontline health care workers), A2 (senior citizens), A3 (individuals 18-years-old and above with comorbidities), and A5 (indigent population).

But the provincial government, through Gov. Steve Chiongbian Solon, decided after a consultation with the PHO to allot the Pfizer shots to senior citizens due to their limited number.

“We have seen that our senior citizens are the ones who are vulnerable from the virus and since these vaccines are limited, our leaders decided to prioritize them,” Bustria said in a statement.

The ULF, which was acquired by the provincial government for PHP680,000, was delivered to the PHO last September 15.

Bustria said the purchase of the freezer, which can accommodate 4,000 vials of vaccines needing ultralow temperature storage, was earlier approved by the Provincial Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases to facilitate the delivery of Pfizer and other vaccine brands to the province.

The DOH central office said in an earlier advisory that Pfizer vaccines require storage temperature between -80 and -60 degrees Celsius, and -25 to -15 degrees Celsius for Moderna.

“Without a ULF, we cannot get the Pfizer vaccines. That’s the basic requirement for us,” Bustria said.

The provincial government has been continually expanding its Covid-19 vaccination as a strategy to contain the spread of Covid-19 in its seven municipalities.

As of Wednesday night, the province has recorded the lowest cumulative number of infections since last year in Region 12 at 5,306.

It also logged a total of 62 related deaths, also the lowest in the region, and 4,332 recoveries. It has the second-lowest number of active cases with 912. (PNA)