The government will roll out COVID-19 vaccines for five to 11 years old next week, National Task Force (NTF) COVID-19 chief implementer and vaccine czar Sec. Carlito Galvez Jr. said on Monday night.

During the Talk to the People with President Rodrigo Duterte, Galvez confirmed that the government is "ready to implement the vaccination for five to 11 years old next week."

"Our memorandum guidelines will be released this week and the town hall meeting led by the Department of Health (DOH) and series of training will continue from this week from January 24 to 28," he said.

"The supplies will arrive next week and we can do the roll out by February 4, next Friday," he added.

Galvez said during the rollout there will be two vaccination sites in every city in Metro Manila that will offer the vaccination for children five to 11 years old.

"The plan is for the national vaccination center to have two vaccination sites in every city in NCR immediately, we will open hospital and non-hospital vaccination sites and we will expand the sites further to other regions after one week again we will open our vaccination roll out sa Feb. 4, Friday," he said.

"The preparations for our vaccination includes capacity building of the vaccination teams, (town halls) to the public, vaccination sites preparations and vaccination sites final inspection that will be conducted from January 25 to 31," he added.

Galvez also assures the public that the COVID-19 vaccines for the younger population are "very safe".

"We can assure parents that the vaccines that we are going to use are very safe because its formulation is less, which is just right for the children, that is why in vial we will see color coding, orange and purple. Orange is for five to 11 years old," he said. Robina Asido/DMS