Philippines starts rollout of second booster dose against COVID

The Philippines on Monday started giving second COVID-19 booster doses for immunocompromised adults, joining a growing number Asian countries offering a fourth vaccine shot.

Nearly 61 per cent of the Philippines' 110 million population have been vaccinated, while nearly 13 million people have received first booster doses, government data show.

Of 690,000 people deemed most vulnerable, between 7,000 and 13,000 have been initially targeted for the second round of boosters, to increase protection against COVID and its variants.

"Because of increasing vaccination coverage, while COVID-19 is still there, in the near future we can consider this as an endemic disease," Health Secretary Francisco Duque told a public forum.

Among those that have approved the use of second booster are South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore.

The Philippines has been cautious with its reopening, despite efforts to revive an economy that contracted more than 9 per cent in 2020, having been one of Asia's fastest growing before the pandemic.

With 3.68 million cases overall and more than 60,000 deaths, the country has suffered one of the worst COVID crises in Southeast Asia, although new daily infections have fallen significantly, now at an average 207 per day, just 1 per cent of the peak, according to a Reuters global data tracker.