Malacañang releases COVID-19 vaccine priority list

Malacañang on Friday released the list of specific priority groups for the government’s COVID-19 vaccination program.

The priority list is as follows:

A1: Frontline workers in health facilities both national and local, private and public, health professionals and non-professionals like students, nursing aides, janitors, barangay health workers, etc.
A2: Senior citizens aged 60 years old and above
A3: Persons with comorbidities not otherwise included in the preceding categories
A4: Frontline personnel in essential sectors including uniformed personnel and those in working sectors identified by the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases as essential during an enhanced community quarantine
A5: Indigent population not otherwise included in the preceding categories
B1: Teachers, social workers
B2: Other government workers
B3: Other essential workers
B4: Socio-demographic groups at significantly higher risk other than senior citizens and indigenous people
B5: Overseas Filipino Workers
B6: Other remaining workforce
C: Rest of the Filipino population not otherwise included in the above groups

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Malacañang releases COVID-19 vaccine priority list

According to Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque, the list was adopted by the Interim National Immunization Technical Advisory Group (iNITAG).

He said the iNITAG also noted that any specific inclusion and exclusion criteria of each COVID-19 vaccine, as reflected in the respective Emergency Use Authorization of the Food and Drug Administration, or recommendations from the Health Technology Assessment Council, should be factored in.

The sub-prioritization selection would be based on the following:

Burden of disease due to COVID-19 (current active cases, attack rate per 100,000 population in the past four weeks, and population density)
vaccination site and/or local government unit readiness, particularly, its supply chain capability

In December 2020, Malacañang said the top 5 priority sectors for COVID-19 vaccination and the number of populations it will provide per group are the following:

1st priority- Frontline health workers (1,762,994)
2nd priority- Indigent senior citizens (3,789,874)
3rd priority- Remaining senior citizens (5,678,544)
4th priority- Remaining indigent population (12,911,193)
5th priority- Uniformed personnel (525, 523)

The government targets to begin the country’s COVID-19 vaccination program this month.