Phase 1 of real-world study on COVID-19 vaccines will start at PGH

MANILA - The first phase of a study that will look into the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines in a real-world setting will be conducted in the UP-Philippine General Hospital, its project leader said Thursday.

Dr. Regina Berba, head of UP-PGH's infectious control unit, said the first phase of the study involving health-care workers would start in the next 2 weeks.

"We have already received ethics approval for this. We're going to identify the vaccinated health-care workers and follow them through," she told ANC's "Rundown".

"There will be 2 surveillance systems. We will watch them closely over time. 'Yong isa (The first one is), antibody testing at saka 'yong isa (the other one is), real-world, magkaka-COVID ba sila o hindi (will they develop COVID-19 or not)," she added.

Berba said the second phase of the study that may happen next month would be community-based. The last phase of the study involving all regions in the country may start in the next 2 months.

"We're going to estimate the effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccines and the different brands we've used across different kinds of people," she said.

Berba said they planned to get over 20,000 individuals for the study.

• Philippines to launch P100-M study on effects of COVID-19 vaccines on Filipinos

The Department of Science and Technology earlier said the study would cost about P100 million.

The Philippines, which began its nationwide inoculation program in March, has been using anti-coronavirus jabs from AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Sinovac and Sputnik V.

As of May 30, the country has administered over 5.1 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, of which 1.2 million were fully vaccinated.