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Khairy Jamaluddin has asked the finance minister to set aside a few billion
ringgit in Budget 2021 for a Covid-19 vaccine.
People aged above 60 years or who have underlying medical conditions, like
diabetes, lung or heart disease, or conditions that affect their immune system, are
more likely to develop severe disease from Covid-19. About 18 per cent of
Malaysian adults have diabetes.
“If you go for optional purchase and decide to immunise 10 per cent of your
population, just the down payment alone is going to be RM90 million,” Khairy
told The Star in a virtual interview yesterday.
“You’re talking about a big commitment here. So, obviously, cost is an issue.”
“Don’t expect that once a vaccine is approved, Malaysia buys, we’re going to get
30 million doses on day one. It comes in stages,” Khairy said.
He added that he has asked the finance minister to set aside a few billion ringgit in
the federal budget next year for a Covid-19 vaccine. Budget 2021 is scheduled to
be tabled in Parliament next month.
Khairy also said that although the deadline for advance payments to reserve Covid-
19 vaccine doses with COVAX is today, based on his discussions with COVAX,
the facility will not shut its doors to any countries after the deadline.
Hence, he said that Malaysia is still in negotiations and discussions with COVAX.
The Gavi spokesperson also said that certain countries have requested additional
time to submit their agreements, hence Gavi is working with these governments to
ensure they receive the agreements as soon as possible. COVAX is led by Gavi,
WHO, and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations.
Furthermore, Khairy highlighted several issues with regards to the COVAX facility
— issues with negotiations with pharmaceutical companies that are entirely done
by the COVAX facility, tax payments, indemnities, transportation cost, and
liability. However, he said that he can only speak of these issues in general themes
as COVAX has insisted on confidentiality of the terms.
Khairy also said that he has been discussing COVAX with the Ministry of Finance
(MOF), the Ministry of Health (MOH), Health director-general Dr Noor Hisham
Abdullah, and he has even presented it to Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin twice.
“We obviously want to still intend to join as this is also bulk purchase, global
solidarity, but the terms have to be fair to the countries who decide to join.”
Hence, he said that maybe, the first round of immunisation will at least be free, but
subsequently it may not. However, he said as a science minister, his
recommendation is for free vaccines for the public’s good.
He stressed that there is limited data on the Covid-19 candidate vaccine to come up
with numbers to decide on the percentage of the population to be vaccinated to
achieve herd immunity.
Bilateral Agreements
According to Khairy, the COVAX facility only allows governments to get vaccines
to vaccinate up to 50 per cent of the population, hence the government still has to
make bilateral agreements to procure a vaccine.
Khairy said that the government has signed non-disclosure agreements with many
pharmaceutical companies, is in the process of finalising a memorandum of
understanding with China, and is trying to have government-to-government
agreements of understanding to secure a supply of vaccine once it is approved.
The minister also said that many countries have put down a lot of money for
advance purchases and are doing that on a risk basis, as some of the vaccines
purchased in advance may not be approved.
“Malaysia — we have to be careful because our financial abilities are not as broad
as some of these other countries.”
Khairy said that the cost of the vaccines vary and have a wide range, saying that
the range can go from US$5 (RM20.76) per vaccine dose to US$60 (RM249.15).
“For me, it’s worth spending the money, because this is the biggest public health
crisis that we’ve confronted in our lifetime.”
Deployment Of Blockchain
Khairy said that discussions are ongoing on how to ensure that one is vaccinated,
considering the vaccines Malaysia purchases may be coming from different
pharmaceutical companies.
He suggested that an electronic health certificate can be put on the MySejahtera
Covid-19 management application and people can prove that they have received
the vaccine on a particular date.
Besides that, the government is also hoping to work with other foreign
governments to mutually recognise the electronic health certificate to allow people
to travel.
Since Malaysia, like many other countries, has a robust group of anti-vaxxers,
Khairy stressed that public health risk communication around the vaccine is very
important.
Khairy said that assuming phase three clinical data of candidate vaccines come out
in November or December, and the regulatory process will be in a couple months
after that, following which, there will be the production of the vaccine somewhere
around the middle of next year, communication with the public on the vaccine
should be started by December.