Moscow, Mar 17 (Agency) The Philippine Department of Health on Wednesday ruled out vaccination as the cause of a health worker’s death, saying the patient came down with COVID-19. “The death was caused by COVID-19 itself, not by the COVID-19 vaccine. COVID-19 vaccines cannot cause COVID-19,” a statement read. The patient was reported dead on Monday after receiving a dose of COVID-19 vaccine and subsequently tested positive for the virus.
The brand of the vaccine was not specified. The health authorities urged the population to keep getting vaccinated amid a spike in infections in the Southeast Asian archipelago nation. The Philippines started rolling out the vaccine on March 1 after receiving the first batch of vaccine doses from China’s Sinovac. It has received 1.1 million doses of Sinovac and AstraZeneca vaccines donated by China and through the UN vaccine-sharing mechanism COVAX.