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Vaccine committee to meet Tuesday to study clinical data on AstraZeneca vaccine Health Ministry to find out reasons behind low registration for vaccine

THE government has put in place backup plans should the Special Vaccine Supply Access Guarantee Committee decide to defer the use of the AstraZeneca Covid19 vaccine.

Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said discussions were being carried out with several vaccine manufacturers, including Novavax, a biotechnology company based in Maryland, the United States.

“If the committee decides that the AstraZeneca vaccine is not suitable for use, we have backup plans in place.

“We have also received an offer from Pfizer to buy another 12.8 million doses of their vaccine, in addition to the 30 million doses that we have ordered,” Khairy said after a meeting with Johor Menteri Besar Datuk Hasni Mohammad at the Datuk Jaafar Muhammad building here yesterday.

He said the committee would meet tomorrow to study the clinical data on the AstraZeneca vaccine.

“We do take note of reports from the United Kingdom’s

Medicine and Healthcare Product Regulatory Agency regarding cases of people suffering from blood clots after being inoculated with the AstraZeneca vaccine.

“The committee will listen to the feedback from experts regarding the vaccine. Any decisions on its use will be made later.”

He said although the AstraZeneca vaccine had been given conditional approval by the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency, it had yet to arrive in Malaysia.

“The AstraZeneca vaccine is scheduled to arrive in May. People should not worry as we are still using the Pfizer-BioNTech and SinoVac vaccines,” he said.

Khairy, who is the coordinating minister for the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme, said Malaysia had ordered 6.4 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine and was scheduled to get an additional 1.4 million doses via the Covax initiative.

Hasni said the Johor government would launch a new application called Immu Plan Johor to register workers and students who commute regularly to Singapore.

“We hope to register about 100,000 workers and students under this application.

“On when will they get the vaccines, it will depend on the arrival of the vaccines in Malaysia.”

Khairy welcomed the state government’s plan to introduce the application.

“We can integrate the data with MySejahtera,” he said.

The (Special Vaccine Supply Access Guarantee) committee will listen to the feedback from experts regarding the vaccine. Any decisions on its use will be made later.

KHAIRY JAMALUDDIN Coordinating minister for the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme