The government is earmarking P61 billion for booster shots of the COVID-19 vaccine in the 2022 national budget, according to Senator Sonny Angara on Sunday.

Angara, who is also the chair of the Senate Committee on Finance, told DZRH that Congress added an additional P16 billion to the initial allocation of P45 billion to make it P61 billion.

This will be enough for over 100 million Filipinos, according to Angara.

"Nasa budget po ng 2022 ‘yung P45 billion ay dinagdagan ng kongreso yun ng P16 billion so may P61 billion tayo for booster shots at yun ay sapat sa mahigit 100 milyong Pilipino," he told DZRH in an interview.

He even said that if the vaccines could become privately available, then there could be excessive jabs since more people can buy their own shots.

"Pero publicly available, there's going to be at least a hundred million, good sign yun kasi kahit magkaroon ng bagong strain at kumalat, at the very least karamihan ng populasyon natin ay protektado dahil bakunado, may booster shot at yun ay may dagdag immunity laban sa COVID-19," he said.

(But for the vaccines publicly available, there’s going to be at least a hundred million. That’s a good sign because even if a new strain spreads, at the very least majority of our population will be protected because they are vaccinated. They have booster shots and have additional immunity against COVID-19.)

"Ang pinakamagandang ebidensya na mapopondohan 'yan ay napondohan for this year yung nilagay namin sa unprogrammed na para sa bakuna," he said.

(Our biggest evidence that it will be funded is that we funded for this year the unprogrammed funds for the vaccines.)

The Senate began deliberating last week the P5.024-trillion budget requested by the current administration.