A total of 4,752 Business Process Outsourcing employees and market vendors were inoculated with anti-Covid vaccines as the city government steps up its campaign, Mayor Evelio “Bing” Leonardia, said yesterday.
Leonardia, chair of the Emergency Operations Center, together with Vice Mayor El Cid Familiaran, head of the local Inter-Agency Task Force, and City Administrator and EOC executive director Em Legaspi-Ang, led the initial rollout of the city’s mobile vaccination drive, or Vax-i, that paved the way for the inoculation of 428 vendors and workers at the city public markets, with 124 inoculated in Libertad Market, 190 in the Central Market, and 114 in the Burgos Market, Friday.
FULL SCHEDULE
It was apparently a full schedule for Leonardia, the EOC, and teams of doctors, nurses, and other health front-liners as they were also on hand to witness when 1,620 employees of two BPO firms received anti-Covid jabs Saturday, a press release from the city said.
Teleperformance employees, numbering around 490 got their first dose of Sinovac at a local mall, while some 1,130 PanAsiatic Solutions Bacolod call center agents and admin staff received Sinovac jabs at the company’s own facilities.
The weekend on-site vaccination and rollout at the different malls for call center personnel brought to 4,324 the total number of BPO employees inoculated, to date, Ang said.
Transcom had the most number of agents inoculated at 1,600, followed by PanAsiatic Solutions – 1,130, Teleperformance – 1,096, Concentrix – 182, IQOR – 130, Ubiquity – 100, ARB – 66, and Contractual – 20.
DOUBLED EFFORTS
“As your local government’s commitment, we will double our efforts to reach as many residents to get vaccinated through a combination of strategies – at mass vaccination sites, through our mobile Vax-i, and on-site or walk-ins at local malls,” Leonardia said.
“This is a classic case of the proverbial ‘If the mountain cannot go to Mohamed, let Mohamed go to the mountain’,” he added, apparently referring to an effective mantra in good governance that government should bring its services closer to the people.
“Our goal is to make the vaccination program more accessible to everyone so we can have safer communities and achieve herd immunity and control, if not eradicate, Covid-19 as fast as possible,” the mayor stressed.
ROLL-OUTS
Leading the Teleperformance Bacolod vaccine rollout were site director Andrea Resurreccion, HR director Claire Bedia, and HR supervisor Marili Lim.
The PanAsiatic Solutions-Bacolod vaccine rollout was led by site director Siony Hijara Ferraris, general manager and operations director Rogie Arceñas, and HR manager and CompBen Ma. Teresa Nolasco.
Joining Leonardia in the Teleperformance Bacolod vaccination drive were Councilor Carl Lopez and EOC deputy for medical, Dr. Chris Sorongon.
The onsite vaccination on two PanAsiatic Solutions facilities were supervised by Ang, who is also concurrent CoVaC coordinator, and EOC deputy for Medical Dr. Anna Maria Laarni Pornan, who is also the head of the City Disaster Risk Reduction Management Office, with the assistance of EOC doctors, nurses, barangay health workers, and CDRRMO staff.
“Teleperformance is one of the first BPOs in Bacolod to organize a mass vaccination rollout for employees through the support of the local government. This initiative re-affirms TP’s commitment not only to protect the health of its people, but also to help our local government address the pandemic with agile, large-scope support of its programs at the corporate level”, Teleperformance said in a statement. PanAsiatic, on the other hand, said, “We highly appreciate the LGU’s efforts to get Covid-19 vaccines for our employees. We remain committed to keep the workplace safe for our people and help everyone get a better shot of ending the pandemic”.*
