I was informed about the incident in Makilala town in North Cotabato involving the recent power outage and the damage of some 348 vials of Coronavac, the corona virus vaccine by Sinovac.

I urge the diligence of everyone concerned so that this incident will not happen again. We cannot afford negligence or even a simple overlook to derail and affect the government’s vaccination drive.

I reiterate my earlier directive to our power stakeholders to ensure reliable and stable electric power supply to support COVID-19 vaccine cold storage and health care facilities.

Per report from the Cotabato Electric Cooperative (Cotelco), a power outage occurred around 1:30pm on May 7 (Friday) that lasted for one hour and 30 minutes. It was one of the affected lines during the multiple outages in South and North Cotabato due to strong winds. 

You will recall that as early as February, we have been working with the members of the Energy family to ensure that the vaccines will be protected at all cost when it is rolled out nationwide. 

The Department of Energy- Electric Power Industry Management Bureau (DOE-EPIMB) and the Task Force on Energy Resiliency (TFER) have worked together in undertaking a “triple safeguard” approach to securing power services in vaccine storage and administration sites. The approach is similar to what was employed during the 2019 Southeast Asian Games which the country hosted. 

Based on this protocol, there would be three power backups. The first line would be coming from the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP), the second from the Distribution Utilities, while the third and final back up would be the generators provided by the facility itself or the local government unit (LGU).

In this particular case in Cotabato, the vaccine cooling equipment was transferred to a genset supply by their municipal health workers. Unfortunately, and for whatever reason, it wasn't connected back to the main line when the power came back. It took two days before they realized that there was no longer any supply to the cooling equipment as the genset had already been turned off.

As a reinforcement, the DOE will issue advisory or reminders to the electric cooperatives (ECs) and LGUs about the protocol in case similar incidents occur. If needed, the DOE is ready to work with the LGUs to conduct some lectures or seminars  on what to do when outages occur.

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