26 Children Dies Because Of Dengvaxia

As of January 24, 26 children already died and all of them were vaccinated with Dengvaxia.

“As of January 24, 2018, from the total of 837, we have admitted cases of 725 and out of that, 26 died. From March 2016 to January 19, the reported deaths were 21. But since last week until this week, we have another five deaths. So a total of 26… from March 2016 to January 24, 2018,” Health Assistant Secretary Maria Francia Laxamana said.

DOH Secretary Francisco Duque clarified that there are already deaths before the Dengvaxia shots were given.

“The 725, these are the AEFI, these are the Adverse Effects Following Immunization. The way to contextualize this, even without Dengvaxia, there is a case fatality ratio. May namamatay talaga dahil sa dengue. You want to do a comparison, makikita ninyo the case fatality ratio is still below one percent,” said Duque.

Duque also revealed that the Phase 3 of the clinical trial of Dengvaxia was not yet finished when the mass vaccination started. He did not answer when asked if the former DOH officials rushed the program. However, he noted that they should have waited for the Phase 3 to finish.

“Well, it appears that based on this information, they could have waited until the phase 3 clinical trial concluded.”