PETALING JAYA,Jan 11: Government has agreed to procure an additional 12.2 million doses of vaccine produced by Pfizer-BioNTech, the health ministry announced today.
This brings the total dosage the government is purchasing to combat the Covid-19 virus to 25 million. This increase will see 39% of the population receiving the vaccine.
The ministry revealed this after signing a Manufacturing & Supply Agreement (MSA) with Pfizer (Malaysia) this morning.
The agreement was signed through a live conference by Health Minister Dr Adham Baba, on behalf of the government, and Pfizer’s country manager (Malaysia and Brunei) Luksanawan Thangpaibool.
The agreement with Pfizer will see the pharmaceutical company supply 12,799,800 doses by the end of February to cover 20% of the population.
“The agreement that was signed today represents the first phase of the supply of vaccines for the entire country,” the ministry said.
The MSA signed today comes days after the vaccine was approved by the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA), the ministry’s regulatory body on pharmaceutical products in the country.
The vaccine was co-developed by US-based Pfizer Inc and German biotechnology firm BioNTech. Two doses per person are required for vaccination. The companies say the vaccine is more than 90% effective.
