Health minister talks up pandemic lessons, vaccine development

EXCLUSIVE | At its peak, the Covid-19 pandemic overwhelmed Malaysia’s healthcare system as it went on to claim 37,189 lives.

According to Health Minister Dr Zaliha Mustafa, the number of fatalities has reduced considerably in recent times, with three so far in November and eight deaths in October.

She told Malaysiakini in an exclusive interview that the lessons of the pandemic must never be forgotten.

“If you ask how prepared we are to face another pandemic, we must always be prepared, especially having learnt from one.

“We have learned how to manage manpower, equipment and medical supplies.

“We're also looking at working with the Science, Technology, and Innovation Ministry to look at the development of vaccines, and regional and international bodies like the World Health Organization and Asean, in terms of future procurement.

“In terms of readiness, currently we are still monitoring the Covid-19 cases, but currently, the reports are fewer than 300 cases a day, so that's a sign that it has been managed,” said Zaliha.

Asked if the impact of vaccinations was crucial to managing the pandemic she replied: “I would say so.”

She conceded that while the impact of the vaccinations was clear to those who understood the scientific process and concepts, more work needs to be done in the event of another situation of similar magnitude, as many Malaysians remained unconvinced.

“This means that much education work still needs to be done for the message to reach the people,” she said.

The Sekijang MP added that the development of vaccines was not a stagnant process but a dynamic one.

“Now even the world is talking about monovalent vaccines and no more on bivalent vaccines, so there are always updates.

“At one point it was about different variants, but eventually it became sub-variants of Omicron,” said Zaliha.

Ongoing process

Last year, Covid-19 vaccine formulations were updated to a bivalent formulation targeting the Omicron variant as well as the original strain that was first detected in Wuhan, China.

This year's formulation is updated with a monovalent formulation based on the XBB.1.5 variant.

Neither of the updated formulations was made available in Malaysia.

Early this month, the Public Accounts Committee revealed that the government sustained RM505 million in losses due to expired Covid-19 vaccines.

The amount involved some 8.5 million vaccine doses which expired by June 1.

Last week, Science, Technology, and Innovation Minister Chang Lih Kang said his ministry was strengthening the national vaccine ecosystem to ensure Malaysia is ready to face any pandemic threat in the future.

He also said the government was focusing on producing vaccines for humans through improved collaborations between agencies and the industry, both at home and abroad and that it had channelled funds totalling RM33 million for the implementation of 13 vaccine research projects from 2021 until September this year.

“When you ask me about preparedness, I think we’re quite ready but of course in terms of developments of vaccines, it’s an ongoing process,” Zaliha said.

This is Part 3 of the interview.

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