The next Health secretary will have big shoes to fill when it comes to revitalizing the health sector and the country’s recovery from the pandemic, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said.

She said that the next health chief’s primary concern is the possible extension of the declaration of State of Public Health Emergency issued by outgoing President Rodrigo Duterte in March 2020.

The declaration was extended until September 30, and it is up to the next health chief, as the chairman of the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID), to recommend to incoming President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. whether it will be extended or not.

Vergeire earlier said that the lifting of the state of public health emergency will have wide-ranging implications, chief of which is the effectiveness of vaccines under emergency use authorization (EUA).

“Once the state of calamity ends, our EUA will not work anymore, so the government has to discuss this thoroughly so that our vaccines would have the CPR). For us to have the CPR, the manufacturers have to finish phase four of their clinical trials,” Vergeire said in a media briefing on June 3.

She added that the government is assessing the public health emergency “day by day,” noting that the increase in cases due to the presence of the new sub variants and the continuing challenge in booster vaccinations make it difficult to estimate when the state of public health emergency could be lifted.

“We need to work on all of this before we can finally give a recommendation to the next administration on whether the state of calamity will be lifted or not,” Vergeire said.

Infectious disease expert Dr. Edsel Maurice Salvana admitted that the Covid-19 virus continues to spring “surprises” on its transmissibility and capability to make people sicker, as shown by the presence of the Delta and Omicron sub variants.

“We cannot say with full confidence that this will be done. We can take cues from the World Health Organization so we could study this further and be more careful,” Salvana added.

Vergeire said that the next administration should also continue to stem the misinformation and disinformation during the pandemic, especially when it comes to vaccination.

She said that science and evidence should continue to hold sway in the country’s decisionmaking process when it comes to policies on the pandemic.

Another main focus of the next health chief is increasing the number of Filipinos getting their booster shots, since most of those who have received their second booster shots are now experiencing waning immunity, making them vulnerable for Covid-19.

Data from the DOH-NATIONAL Vaccination Operations Center showed that while nearly 70.4 million have received their complete two doses of vaccines, nearly 15 million have received their booster shots.

The duty of convincing people to get vaccinated as well as the procurement of next-generation vaccines that shield people from the Omicron sub variant will be supervised by Vergeire. She will succeed Health Undersecretary Myrna Cabotaje as the Incident Manager and Chairman of the National Vaccination Operations Center.

Vergeire also urged the next administration to pass three key health measures that were not passed in the Duterte administration: the creation of a Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the Vaccine Institute of the Philippines, and the National Health Security Bill.

She said that these measures will resolve the issue of pandemic preparedness in the country and would allow the health-care system to be more resilient.

Meanwhile, Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines president Dr. Jose Rene De Grano also said that the new health chief should have an “open communication” with doctors, hospitals, and different healthcare facilities on the new administration’s health-care agenda.