KUALA LUMPUR: The government is set to ramp up the Covid-19 National Immunisation Programme with the arrival of more Sinovac and Pfizer- BioNTech vaccination doses from July.
Coordinating Minister for the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme Khairy Jamaluddin said some half-million Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine doses from China and bottled locally by Pharmaniaga Bhd would be made available to be administered to recipients for May and June.
"In addition, we will also be able to ramp up vaccination for Pfizer from July onwards as we will receive some 2.5 million doses.
"We are progressing for the second phase of NIP, starting with the senior citizens. Those with disability and comorbidities will be next," said the Science, Technology and Innovation Minister in a Press conference via Zoom today.
On the vaccination drive, Khairy said in total, 1,935,632 Covid-19 vaccine doses have thus far been administered under the NIP.
He said 1,202,395 of the first dose were administered, with 733,237 people having completed the two doses.
A total of 3,199,900 vaccine doses have been delivered by Pfizer, Sinovac and AstraZeneca, thus far.
He said the NIP registration rate have also increased to 42 per cent (from 40 per cent last week), based on the ratio of population aged 18 and above in Malaysia, with a total of 10,182,880 people natinwide having signed up for it.
He later said there was 20 per cent absentee rate of recipients who failed to turn up on the set date for the vaccination, he said.
"We found that some were not able to come due to the fasting month, while some had transportation issues. We are looking into ways to assist the elderly to get to the vaccination centres."
For the second phase of NIP, he said as of May 16, 702,702 appointments have been made for targeted groups, namely, senior citizens, as well as individuals with comorbidities and disabilities.
A total of 475,984 first doses and 282,000 second doses had been administered since the beginning of Phase 2 on April 19.
On the AstraZeneca opt-in programme at AstraZeneca Vaccination Centres (PPVAZ) which were opened yesterday, a total of 10,668 people received Covid-19 vaccination at WTCKL (8,595), Universiti Malaya (1,090) and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (983).
WTCKL is currently Malaysia's largest PPVAZ, has an average daily capacity of 8,100 vaccine doses, with 8,360 doses administered on Saturday and 8,595 doses yesterday.