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The Philippines on Friday received another batch of Sinovac Biotech's CoronaVac vaccines with 1.5 million doses, purchased from China, the fifth delivery until now.

The country has secured 25 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines developed by Sinovac. So far, the Philippines has received five million doses of Sinovac vaccines, including one million doses donated by China.

The government aims to inoculate up to 70 million Filipinos this year to achieve herd immunity.

The Southeast Asian country is ramping up vaccination efforts as it continues to battle a surge of COVID-19 infections fuelled by more infectious variants and people's complacency to safety protocols.

"Our speed in vaccination is greatly dependent on the availability of the vaccines," the country's Department of Health said.

The Philippines has reported a total of 1,080,172 COVID-19 cases as of Thursday, including 17,991 deaths.