How a fishing town handled vaccine rollout

Navotas City, a coastal town in Metro Manila, is known for being the fishing capital of the Philippines. Urbanized, congested, and smaller than its counterparts in the Metro, Navotas had to work double-time to vaccinate its residents from the deadly airborne disease COVID-19.

But the city is in good hands. One particular doctor that the team of Relief International and Unicef (RI-Unicef) closely worked with was Dr. Christia Padolina, the medical director of Navotas City Hospital. Padolina currently oversees the vaccination rollout in the city.

Need for good leaders. Loved and respected, Padolina is known for being strict and for her demanding leadership. Residents and staff would joke, “Masungit si doc (Doc is ill-tempered),” but the banter only partially reflects how Padolina treats her staff, handles problems, and deals with authorities.

For Padolina, good leadership means knowing how to motivate people. At a time of severe health crisis, what’s crucial is communication between leaders and people. “At one point, I also talked to the mayor and I told him that (the buck) doesn’t stop with me. The leadership should be able to clearly appreciate people from the ground and motivate them to work harder,” she said. While leaders acknowledged the need to engage with the community early on, it was through the help of RI-Unicef that the city’s leaders and experts reached out to residents and marginalized sectors at the onset of the vaccination campaign in the country. RI-Unicef conducted house-to-house campaigns, advocacy and learning sessions with mothers and schools, and organized capacity planning and technical tool training to empower local community leaders. Addressing lapses in communication. But like other cities, Navotas had a problem with communication: How do you let people know they need the COVID-19 vaccine enough to make them go voluntarily to the vaccination site? People need to get the message first. Said Dr. Padolina: “We can’t just expect people to abide by protocols and get vaccinated if we don’t communicate what it’s all about.”

Communication needs to be streamlined with all health workers and local government employees. Through communication channels opened by RI-Unicef, COVID-19 was treated as a problem that needed whole-of-community solutions. Padolina, experts, and stakeholders have been meeting since March 2021. Representatives continuously report progress on contact tracing, COVID-positive patients, and overall COVID-19 response.

Part of communicating the importance of COVID-19 vaccines is making them available to the community. With fisherfolk as the main contributor to the city’s trade, RI-Unicef brought the vaccinators to the fisherfolk, where they organized individual and small group learning sessions. Some 100 Navotas fisherfolk were vaccinated because of these efforts. In turn, the local government held bakuna nights to accommodate those who could not get vaccinated during the day because they were out fishing.

Mindset for the future. With most of the population now vaccinated, it’s time to turn the community’s sights to the future. But, for Padolina, COVID-19 will never go away: “I think the community should embrace the idea that we will never go back to normal.”

Already, Navotas is streamlining the digitization of its health services and teleconsultations. Local health experts are also making a COVID-19 compendium, documenting local government efforts and lessons to abide by in the future. All RI and Unicef efforts on-ground are also adequately documented in a digital file shared with local leaders and updated as necessary. Feedback from constituents is conducted through Google Forms, compiled for the community to use during planning and training.

Soon, Padolina said having policies that prioritize health should ensure the sustainability of their success. “It’s a continuing crisis which needs to have a good policy and direction,” she added. Padolina is particularly grateful for the on-ground efforts of RI and Unicef, calling the partnership “pivotal” in reaching out to Navotas residents from every corner of the city before intervening. “What I appreciate most is the fact that there was an in-depth evaluation of the situation before we entered with an intervention,” she said, pointing out that though “there is no difference in the assistance to be given in other cities,” adjustments should be made “based on the people, their culture, and the social environment that we have.”

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Kara Protomartir develops communication health strategies for Filipinos. She also explores the world through food and people one day at a time.