LETTERS: Authorities should consider procuring more than one type of vaccine for a disease to cover for potential vaccine failure and deploy a multi-vaccine strategy to increase the chances of successful vaccinations.
Understandably, potential inefficiencies and practicality issues have to be considered given that buying different types of vaccines would present logistical complications.
This, without taking into account the impact on government expenses. Some vaccines could be more temperature-sensitive and less resilient to physical agitation.
Poorly established supply chains, cold storage and distribution chains may fail, and human errors may occur due to a lack of training and familiarity.
It is necessary to consider buying a buffer supply to account for potential handling losses.
Lastly, achieving herd immunity at a national level is dependent not only on a high enough percentage of the population being vaccinated and retaining immunity, it also requires uniformity.
This means having a sufficient number of vaccinated people spread evenly throughout the population to surround and protect the unvaccinated ones. According to a survey by Ipsos from July 24 to Aug 7, 15 per cent of Malaysians disagreed about getting vaccinated.
Assuming the 15 per cent are "antivaxxers" mostly concentrated in rural areas, clusters of infection could still spread in these communities.
Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Khairy Jamaluddin has shown considerable insight into the matter during a Facebook Live session, which also indicated the possibility of billions of ringgit being allocated for vaccinations in the 2021 Budget.
Khairy had also given his assurance that the authorities will set up a task force to carry out early preparations prior to receiving vaccines.
Without the approval and implementation of vaccination programmes within a well-thought-of national budget, the negative health and socio-economic impacts of diseases such as Covid-19 are expected to be prolonged and worsened.
Ameen Kamal
EMIR Research, Kuala Lumpur
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times