Assemblyman welcomes vaccine arrival

KOTA KINABALU: Usukan assemblyman Datuk Seri Dr Salleh Said Keruak welcomed the news concerning the arrival of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine into Malaysia.

He said the new update has brought back hope as the country struggled with the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic.

He said in his blog ‘https:// sallehsaid.com/’ that the arrival of the vaccine can help the country get back on its feet, particularly with regards to its economy.

Salleh also enumerated that the National Covid-19 Immunisation programme will be implemented in three phases and will start this week.

The first stage will be for frontliners such as health workers and non-health workers, he said.

“And the second stage will be for high-risk members of the community such as those suffering from heart disease, hypertension, diabetes and obesity,” he said.

The second stage is expected to be completed by August this year.

Some 9.4 million people in the country are expected to be vaccinated during the second stage, said Salleh.

Meanwhile, the final stage involving recipients aged 18 years old and above will take place from May and expected to end by February 2022.

He added that the aim of the immunization is to create herd immunity and lead to the control of the pandemic.

Salleh said under the programme, about 80 percent or about 27 million people would be vaccinated by the first quarter of 2022.

He also said that the Sabah government plans to vaccinate three million people in Sabah by February next year.