Vaccine supply: Priority for national programme before states, companies
COVID-19 | State governments ordering vaccines from companies being engaged by Putrajaya for its National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme (NIP) may have to queue for supply.
According to the minister in charge of the programme, Khairy Jamaluddin, an agreement signed between the federal government and the companies stipulate that priority should be given to NIP...
COVID-19 | State governments ordering vaccines from companies being engaged by Putrajaya for its National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme (NIP) may have to queue for supply.
According to the minister in charge of the programme, Khairy Jamaluddin, an agreement signed between the federal government and the companies stipulated that priority should be given to NIP.
"States are allowed to take the initiative to procure Covid-19 vaccine supply on their own, on the condition that the vaccine is approved by the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA).
"However, the Covid-19 Immunisation Task Force (CITF) has noted that the types of vaccine that several states are trying to get, for example, Selangor, are from the same pharmaceutical companies that are engaged for NIP.
"Based on the agreement terms, the priority of supply must be given to the federal government to ensure execution of NIP, before any vaccine supply can be channelled to other parties including state governments, industries or private hospitals that place orders after the federal government, unless it is done through other suppliers not involved with NIP," he said in a statement today.
Khairy had last month said the Selangor and Sarawak governments were free to secure their own supply of vaccines, provided the vaccines were approved for use in the country.
This came after the states requested to do so to speed up the immunisation process.
For the record, Malaysia is in its second phase of NIP, which is aimed at achieving herd immunity by inoculating at least 80 percent of the country's above 18 population by February 2022.
So far, NPRA had approved Covid-19 vaccines made by three companies, namely Pfizer-BioNTech, Sinovac, and AstraZeneca.
Khairy also touched on a company's offer to donate 200,000 doses of the Sinovac vaccine to the government.
The science, technology and innovation minister said that the government had been informed about the offer by Yayasan Sekhar, but urged it to follow the proper channel.
This came after checks with Sinovac and its license holder in Malaysia, Pharmaniaga, found that there was no official request made by the foundation to procure supply from them.
"CITF takes note of the offer made by Yayasan Sekhar to donate Sinovac vaccines to NIP.
"However, checks with Sinovac in China and Pharmaniaga found that there was no procurement, application nor any official document submitted by Yayasan Sekhar to them.
"CITF wants to stress that we do not have any problem if Yayasan Sekhar or any parties want to carry out such a noble action, but it has to be followed by action through the proper channel," Khairy added.
Are you sure you want to delete this comment?
This action cannot be undone.