The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) will be taking immediate action with regards to the alleged claimed of former Special Envoy to China Ramon “Mon” Tulfo declaring that soldiers received “smuggled” COVID-19 vaccine.

Similar report published by the GMA News Online stating that the AFP officials will be taking into consideration to look after the said claim of Mr. Tulfo that soldiers received smuggled COVID-19 vaccines last year.

According to AFP deputy chief-of-staff for civil-military operations Maj. Gen. Benedict Arevalo, said on Thursday during the briefing that they haven’t received yet any information that there are some other soldiers — aside from members of the Presidential Security Group (PSG) — were vaccinated with unauthorized COVID-19 vaccines.

“Narinig pa lang natin ‘yang balita na ‘yan. Allow us to look into that at magbibigay tayo ng additional information sa nakatataas sa atin Aalamin natin kung may reason para mag-conduct tayo ng investigation,” Arevalo said.

This statement of Gen. Benedict Arevalo came after the issue about unauthorized COVID-19 vaccine appeared on the column written by Mr. Tulfo in “The Manila Times” last Saturday which also appeared on “One News” last Tuesday stating that there are some senators; Cabinet-level officials as well as police and military received and vaccinated smuggled COVID-19 from Sinopharm last October 2020.

As to recall the statement of PSG Commander Brigadier General Jesus Durante III last December 2020, he admitted that PSG received COVID-19 vaccines as early as September 2020. It was the time when there was no COVID-19 vaccine approved by the Department of Health (DOH) but it said that the PSG were given in order to ensure that they’re not a threat to the health of the president.

Durante noted that his unit acquired the vaccine for free, but he refused to disclose its source. He also said that only within the circle of the military personnel who were vaccinated the unauthorized COVID-19 vaccine and there’s nobody outside the military was involved in the inoculation.

However, Sinopharm has denied that they supplied the COVID-19 vaccine used on the PSG members.

Sinopharm is a Chinese state-owned enterprise under the China National Pharmaceutical Group Corp.