MANILA— The Philippines on Tuesday night welcomed an additional 2 million donated Sinovac COVID-19 shots from China, hours after the country received over 2.4 million other donated jabs.

The shipment arrived at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Terminal 2 via Philippine Airlines flight PR359 around 6 p.m. Earlier in the day, 2.4 million shots of Janssen and Moderna vaccines donated by France, Spain and the Netherlands also reached the country.

The Chinese donation increases the country's vaccine deliveries to nearly 162 million doses, data gathered by the ABS-CBN Investigative and Research Group showed.

China's government earlier in the year also donated 2 million Sinovac jabs to the Philippines.

Philippines has procured over 52 million Sinovac shots, the biggest among other brands being used in the country. Pfizer came second at 27.7 million jabs.

• 2-M more Sinovac jabs to arrive next week: Chinese envoy

The donation came in the wake of tensions between the two countries last month after Chinese coast guard vessels blocked and fired water cannons at boats that were going to deliver fresh supplies to Filipino marines stationed in Ayungin Shoal in the West Philippine Sea.

Top officials from both sides engaged in a word war, as other countries like the US, Japan and Australia expressed concern over the incident and asserted anew the importance of peace and stability in the South China Sea, within which is the West Philippine Sea.

• Lorenzana says China is trespasser at Ayungin Shoal; UNCLOS, arbitral award back PH claim
• China tells PH to remove BRP Sierra Madre from Ayungin Shoal

VACCINE ROLLOUT

Meanwhile, the country will receive a total of more than 8.24 million COVID-19 vaccine doses on Tuesday, all of which were donated by various governments.

This is considered the largest single-day total of vaccine arrivals, the National Task Force (NTF) Against COVID-19 said.

More than 41.5 million people have been fully immunized against COVID-19, while almost 55 million individuals have received their partial dose.

More than 809,000 people, meanwhile, have received their booster shots.

Vaccine czar Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr. on Monday night said government is confident the country will reach its target of fully vaccinating 54 million Filipinos by the end of the year.

Galvez said on Tuesday that the newly-delivered Sinovac jabs could be used for booster vaccination.

"Majority of our people are also interested of having the boosters of Sinovac... that they are open to homologous vaccination," he told reporters in NAIA.

• Galvez: PH to receive over 24 million vaccine doses this week

Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian said this could help the country's national inoculation days slated on Dec. 15 to 17 as well as the country's economic and social recovery.d

"We will continue, we will do our best to support the Philippines until the final victory against the [pandemic]... We want to deepen our cooperation and contribute our economic recovery in this country," Huang said.

"Our economic cooperation is doing well this year, Philippine export has increased by 50 percent to China," he added.

The government is expecting to immunize 7 million more individuals on December 15 to 17, but some areas will halt inoculation due to the threat of storm Odette.

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