Ang bakuna dili pako. Ang biosecurity mao gihapon ang tiil nga naglakaw.
No. As of 1 August 2026 you still cannot walk into an agri-vet store and buy an ASF vaccine anywhere in the Philippines. The AVAC ASF Live vaccine is still in a government-controlled rollout, and it has been since the first state-administered jab in Lobo, Batangas on 30 August 2024. The DA's commercial-approval target is Q3 2026, which has already slipped once.
Where the vaccine actually stands, 1 August 2026
Three things happened in the last thirteen months and they pull in different directions.
First, the numbers got better. BAI's active-barangay count fell from 98 at the end of December 2025 to 8 across 7 provinces by 8 May 2026. Then it got worse again. FAO's 16 July 2026 situation update put 21 barangays in 17 cities and municipalities across 11 provinces back on the active list as of 10 July, and July kept adding: Lamitan City in Basilan confirmed cases affecting 113 hog raisers with at least 284 pigs dead, Zamboanga City was monitoring seven barangays with more than 200 hogs dead or destroyed, and Bacolod added two more barangays on 27 July. Cebu, for what it is worth, was still reported ASF-free on 16 July.
We keep BAI's national count as its own series, frozen at the 8 May reading instead of carried forward, because a source that stopped should look stopped. The herd behind it is published too, and it reads better as two populations than one: PSA's smallhold inventory and its commercial inventory came back from ASF at visibly different speeds, and the smallhold count is the one that holds most of the country's pigs. Worth knowing before you read the next headline about the industry recovering.
Second, the legal ground moved. Republic Act 12308, the Animal Industry Development and Competitiveness Act, took veterinary drugs, biologics and devices out of FDA hands and gave them to BAI. AVAC's monitored-release certificate expired on 11 July 2026, right in the middle of that handover. So the vaccine is now sitting with a new regulator, under a new law, waiting on a commercial release certificate that DA Assistant Secretary Arnel De Mesa said in June would come in Q3.
Third, the trial data raised questions that were not in the 2024 press releases. DA Region 7's livestock and ASF focal person Voltaire Amper told BusinessMirror on 15 July 2026 that antibodies in vaccinated pigs decline after roughly five months, and that virus fragments were detected in vaccinated animals' urine and intestinal tracts. Neither finding kills the vaccine. Both explain why "approval by Q3" has already slipped once from Q1.
If you are reading this after Q3 2026 closes on 30 September, check the status yourself rather than trusting this paragraph. Ask your municipal or provincial veterinarian one question: "Naa na bay BAI commercial release certificate ang AVAC?" A licensed product will be stocked by BAI-registered biologics outlets, not by hardware stores or online sellers.
What the vaccine is, and what it is not
AVAC ASF Live is a freeze-dried live attenuated vaccine built on ASFV-G-ΔMGF, a genotype II strain with six genes deleted and then adapted through 30 passages in a pig macrophage cell line. Single intramuscular shot. It was licensed for commercial sale in Vietnam in 2023 and imported here for controlled use from 2024.
The published safety and efficacy work (Diep et al., Transboundary and Emerging Diseases, 2025) is genuinely decent for a first-generation ASF vaccine, which is a low bar historically. But read the shape of it, not the headline.
| What you'll hear | What the data actually says |
|---|---|
| "90% effective" | That is DA's reported field figure from the monitored rollout, in healthy, ASF-negative pigs on farms that passed a biosecurity inspection. It is not a challenge-trial number. |
| "One shot protects the pig" | 100% survival on challenge at 28, 90, 120 and 150 days post-vaccination. Only 60% at 14 days, and 40% at 180 days. Immunity has a front end and a back end. |
| "Safe" | A 100-fold overdose produced no abnormal signs over 45 days, and no vaccine virus was shed in secretions in that study. Field monitoring in PH has still flagged virus fragments in urine and gut. |
| "It covers ASF" | It covers highly virulent genotype II. A recombinant genotype I/II strain that has emerged elsewhere in Asia is not neutralised by it. |
| "Give it to the whole herd" | Weanlings and growers 4 weeks and up only. Excluded: gilts, sows, boars. No breeding-animal safety data exists. |
That last row is the one that matters most to anyone running a farrow-to-finish backyard setup. Your sow is the expensive animal. Your sow is also the animal the vaccine will not touch. A vaccine that protects fatteners for roughly the length of one grow-out cycle is a useful tool for a fattening operation and close to irrelevant for a two-sow breeder, at least in its current form. Vietnam's own industry press has been publicly asking for a sow-and-boar vaccine since 2025. Nobody has one yet.
Can you actually get it today? The honest answer
Here is the rule that catches most people out. Under DA Administrative Circular No. 13, Series of 2024, vaccination is permitted only in barangays with no active ASF case for at least 40 days, and only inside Red (Infected) or Pink (Buffer) zones, or where there is evidence of ASF-negative surveillance.
Read that twice. If your barangay is clean and sits in a Green zone, you do not qualify. The program was designed to ring-fence outbreaks and to gather safety data, not to protect every pig in the country. Sus, most raisers who call their municipal agriculture office asking for the shot get turned away for exactly this reason, and nobody explains why.
What the circular does get right for smallholders: there is no minimum number of pigs required, and the pigs do not have to be the same age group. A five-head backyard raiser in a qualifying barangay is eligible on paper, same as a 500-head commercial farm. That was an amendment in AC 13, which replaced the tighter rules in AC 05 and AC 08 of the same year after DA admitted low participation.
| Requirement (AC 13 s.2024) | What it means at backyard scale |
|---|---|
| Barangay with no active case ≥ 40 days, in Red or Pink zone | The gate most raisers fail. Verify your current zone with the municipal vet on the day you ask, not from a map you saw last month. |
| Accomplished letter of intent (Form 1) | One page. The office has the form. |
| Signed Veterinarian-Client Patient Relationship, VCPR (Form 2) | You need a licensed vet attached to your farm. For most backyard raisers this is the municipal vet. |
| DA or BAI registration, or RSBSA listing | If you are not RSBSA-listed, do that first. It is free and it also makes your PCIC premium free. |
| Farm Biosecurity Classification Level 1 for smallhold farms | Level 2 applies to commercial and semi-commercial. Level 1 is the achievable tier: perimeter, single entry, footbath, dedicated boots. |
| Farm vaccination program, if any | Optional. Your existing hog cholera and FMD schedule is fine to submit. |
| Pigs must be apparently healthy or test ASF-negative | Sick pig, no vaccine. Obviously. |
How to ask your municipal agriculture office without wasting a trip
Go in person. Phone calls get "wala pa" and nothing else. Ask for the livestock technician or the municipal veterinarian, not the front desk.
- Ask the zone question first. "Unsa ang zone classification sa among barangay karon?" If the answer is Green or Light Green, the vaccine conversation is over for now, and you should pivot to registration and insurance instead.
- Ask whether the LGU is enrolled at all. Doses flow through DA Regional Field Offices to LGUs that requested them. Many LGUs in Visayas and Mindanao have never requested any, because their barangays never qualified.
- Ask for Form 1 and Form 2 by name. Letter of intent and VCPR. Saying the form numbers signals you have read the circular, which changes the conversation.
- Bring your RSBSA number, or get listed that day. Ask specifically to be added if you are not on it. This same visit is where you enroll in PCIC livestock insurance, which pays ₱10,000 per fattener and ₱14,500 per breeder with a fully subsidised premium for RSBSA-listed backyard raisers.
- Ask what the monitoring commitment is in your municipality. See the next section. Get the answer before you sign, not after.
- Get a name and a callback date. Not a promise. A name.
If your municipality is not enrolled, the useful ask is different: request that the LGU submit a request to the DA Regional Field Office, and ask to be put on the list for when doses arrive. That request costs the office nothing and it is the only way a backyard raiser gets into the queue.
Registration itself is worth doing regardless of the vaccine, and it interacts with your permits, so read the LGU permits and registration guide before you go.
The monitoring obligation is the real price
Nobody advertises this part. Under AC 13, a vaccinated farm is monitored from the day of vaccination to the day the pigs are slaughtered. Not for 30 days. To slaughter.
- Whole blood, serum and nasal swab samples collected at 30 days post-vaccination, and again within 7 days before slaughter if the pig is still on farm.
- Sample size calculated from the Cannon and Roe table at 2% prevalence and 95% confidence. For a 1,000-head population that is 138 pigs. For a five-head backyard pen it means all of them.
- All monitoring documented and submitted to the LGU, the DA Regional Field Office and BAI.
- Movement to slaughter requires a negative RT-PCR result plus a Certificate of Free Status on ASF (CFS-ASF).
- A pig that tests RT-PCR positive with clinical signs is depopulated. A pig that tests positive without clinical signs gets a 7-day movement suspension and a retest, and if it stays positive and DIVA-positive for wild virus, it is depopulated too.
My honest position: for a fattening-only raiser inside a hot zone, this is a trade worth making. Paperwork against a total wipeout is not a close call. For a two-sow breeder in a quiet barangay, the vaccine covers the wrong animals and the compliance load is heavier than the benefit. Spend the same effort on your perimeter and your sourcing rules instead.
Do not buy ASF vaccine online. Ever.
Vials show up on Facebook Marketplace and in messenger groups every few months, usually described as "imported" or "direct from Vietnam." Smuggled ASF and bird flu vaccines have been intercepted in travel luggage, hidden in tumblers and plastic glasses, and CIDG has arrested sellers with DA present.
Buying one is illegal, and the practical risk is worse than the legal one. A live attenuated vaccine that has been through an unrefrigerated luggage compartment is a live virus of unknown potency going into your pen. DA Undersecretary Deogracias Victor Savellano put the policy plainly in 2024: no compromises on illegal sale and use. Veterinary experts have also warned that unauthorised use pushes the virus toward strains that the approved vaccine will not cover.
If someone offers you ASF vaccine for cash before BAI issues a commercial release certificate, they are selling you a felony and a biosecurity breach in the same bottle.
What actually protects your pigs this month
The unglamorous stuff, which has not changed since 2019 and will not change on the day the vaccine is licensed.
- Sourcing. One discounted weaner from an unknown seller is the single most common way ASF enters a backyard pen. Verify the veterinary health certificate with your municipal vet, and refuse animals from any barangay you cannot place on a zone map. The full sourcing and perimeter build is in the ASF-era biosecurity guide.
- Quarantine. 30 days minimum for new arrivals, separate pen, separate scoop, separate boots. If you have nowhere to put a quarantine pen, your pen layout needs fixing before your vaccination status does.
- Footbath discipline. Daily solution change. A week-old footbath is worse than none because it makes people careless.
- Know the picture. Sudden death in more than one pig, high fever, skin reddening, blue ears, bloody scour. Compare against the ASF symptom picture and the general sick-pig signs, then call the municipal vet within 24 hours. Reporting is mandatory.
- Have the outbreak plan written down. The first 48 hours decide how much you lose. Walk through the step-by-step outbreak response before you need it.
- Keep the shots you can actually give. Hog cholera, FMD where required, mycoplasma, plus deworming. The vaccination schedule guide covers what is available to you today, all of which is more relevant to your herd right now than ASF vaccine is.
An ASF vaccine does not make a pig safe to move. Movement of vaccinated pigs still requires a negative RT-PCR and a CFS-ASF certificate under AC 13. Raisers who assume "vaccinated" means "clearable" get stopped at checkpoints and lose the sale.
What changes the day approval lands, and what does not
Assume BAI issues the commercial release certificate this quarter. Here is the realistic first-year picture.
| Your situation | What commercial approval changes |
|---|---|
| Fattening 10 to 30 head, buying weaners in | Real benefit. Vaccinate at 8 to 10 weeks and the protection window roughly matches your grow-out. Budget for the dose plus the vet fee to administer it. |
| Two to five sows, farrow to finish | Partial. You can cover the offspring, not the sows or the boar. The breeding herd stays on biosecurity alone. |
| Native pigs, extensive or semi-scavenging | Low priority. No native-breed-specific data, and the animals hardest to handle are the ones hardest to sample for compliance. |
| Green zone, no ASF nearby for years | Little urgency. Availability will lag approval, and early stock goes where cases are. |
| Currently inside a Red zone | Highest value, and you may already qualify under the controlled program without waiting. Go ask this week. |
What does not change: the price of pork. Farmgate has been sitting at ₱170 to ₱185/kg against a cost of production of ₱180 to ₱200/kg through mid-2026, and feed has gone up three times in two months while producer prices fell five or six times, per the National Federation of Hog Farmers. A vaccine reduces mortality risk. It does nothing for margin. Check what your own region is paying in the regional liveweight price table and the current price tracker before you decide a batch is worth restocking at all.
Free Tool
Pig Profit Simulator
Model a batch with and without a mortality event. The gap between 0% and 15% losses on a ten-head batch is usually bigger than the entire vaccine question.
Your next 30 days
Stop refreshing news sites for the approval announcement. Do these five things instead, in this order, and you will be better placed than the vaccine could make you.
- Get RSBSA-listed and BAI-registered this month if you are not. Free, one visit, and it is the gate for the vaccine program, PCIC insurance and every restocking grant.
- Find out your barangay's current zone classification and write the date next to it. Re-check monthly.
- Fix the one biosecurity hole you already know about. Everyone has one. The gate nobody latches, the boots that go to the palengke, the neighbour who walks in to look at the pigs.
- Pre-write your outbreak phone list: municipal vet, provincial vet, DA regional field office. Tape it inside the feed room.
- If you are in a Red or Pink zone, ask for Form 1 and Form 2 this week. Do not wait for commercialisation.
And keep a healthy suspicion of the timeline. Commercial release was floated for late 2024, then Q1 2026, now Q3 2026. Track the industry dashboard for the live case count rather than the promise count.
Bisaya / Cebuano
Wala pa gyud ma-commercial ang bakuna kontra ASF sa Pilipinas hangtod karon, Agosto 2026. Ang AVAC ASF Live gikan sa Vietnam, controlled rollout pa lang sa gobyerno sukad Agosto 2024. Dili ka makapalit niini sa agri-vet store. Kung naay magbaligya nimo online, ilegal na, ug delikado kay live virus kana nga wala nahibaw-an kung unsa pa ang kusog human sa dugay nga biyahe nga walay yelo.
Duha ka butang ang kinahanglan nimo masabtan. Una, para ra kini sa mga baboy nga weanling ug grower, upat ka semana pataas. Dili kini para sa anay, sa gilt, o sa boar. Mao nga kung breeder ka, ang imong pinakamahal nga hayop mao gyud ang dili maprotektahan. Ikaduha, ang proteksyon mokabat lang og mga lima ka bulan sumala sa DA Region 7, mao nga sakto ra kini sa usa ka grow out cycle, dili sa tibuok tuig.
Kinsa ang pwede maapil? Ang inyong barangay kinahanglan Red o Pink zone ug walay aktibong kaso sulod sa 40 ka adlaw. Kung limpyo ang inyong lugar ug Green zone kamo, wala gyud kamoy dose. Lisod dawaton, pero mao gyud na ang lagda sa DA Administrative Circular No. 13, Series of 2024.
Kung kwalipikado mo, adto sa munisipyo, sa Municipal Agriculture Office. Pangayo og Form 1, ang letter of intent, ug Form 2, ang VCPR nga pirmahan sa lisensyadong beterinaryo. Dad-a ang inyong RSBSA number o BAI registration. Kung wala pa mo listed sa RSBSA, pa-listing dayon kay libre ra, ug libre pod ang premium sa PCIC insurance kung listed ka.
Samtang wala pa, ang biosecurity gihapon ang nagdala sa tanan. Ayaw pagpalit og baboy nga walay health certificate. Kwarentinahon ang bag-ong baboy sulod sa 30 ka adlaw. Ilisan ang footbath matag adlaw. Kung naay kalit nga namatay nga baboy, i report dayon sa munisipyo sulod sa 24 oras. Kana ang tinuod nga depensa, dili ang bakuna nga wala pa maabot.
Related reading
- ASF recovery era biosecurity: the perimeter, footbath and sourcing system the vaccine does not replace
- Disease outbreak response, step by step: what to do in the first 48 hours
- Pig vaccination schedule: the shots you can actually buy today
- Pig diseases and symptoms: telling ASF apart from hog cholera and salmonella
- LGU permits and registration: getting RSBSA-listed and BAI-registered
- State of the industry dashboard: live case counts, herd size and farmgate prices
