KUALA LUMPUR, June 5 — To ensure more people get vaccinated under the National COVID-19 Immunisation Programme, Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin has told the COVID-19 Vaccine Supply Access Guarantee Special Committee (JKJAV) to review the vaccine registration process including the proposal for automatic registration.
The Prime Minister said he also heard complaints from residents in rural areas, villages and the interior especially senior citizens who have difficulties in registering and receiving vaccine.
“For this, I have ordered all ministries and government agencies involved to use all government assets to facilitate them get vaccinated,” he said in a speech on the development of the National COVID-19 Immunisation Programme which was aired over local television stations today.
As at yesterday. 1,127,336 individuals in the country have completed two doses of COVID-19 vaccine.
Taking note of the concerns of many people have yet to receive their vaccine appointment dates, the Prime Minister also ordered JKJAV to ensure they have registered through all platforms to obtain an appointment date as soon as possible.
He said up to today, almost 13 million individuals had registered for COVID-19 vaccine shots which is only 51 per cent of the overall total eligible to receive the vaccine.
In this regard, Muhyiddin also urged the people to come forward as volunteers to assist the smooth process of dispensing vaccine.
He said youths and non-governmental organisations are welcomed to contribute their energy and time to make the largest vaccination exercise in the country’s history a success.
“The involvement and support of all parties is necessary in the approach of the whole of government and whole of society for us to achieve the target of 80 per cent to form herd immunity,” he said.
Touching on the achievement of the immunisation programme which began on Feb 24 2021, the Prime Minister said total daily vaccine jabs have now been raised to around 100,000 compared to 5,000 to 8,000 shots at the start of the programme.
According to Muhyiddin, the government had dispensed more than three million doses of vaccine with more than two million individuals receiving one COVID-19 vaccine dose and taking the rate of first dose vaccination in Malaysia now as among the highest in Southeast Asia.
He said Malaysia would be receiving around 16 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine in the next two months and with the additional supply, the government is targeting the total daily vaccination rate to exceed 150,000 this month and higher.
He said at the moment, more than 280 vaccination centres (PPV) are operating throughout the country and 300 more PPVs are expected to be opened as soon as possible.
In this regard, to ensure that no one is left behind in the vaccination programme, he said the government had launched mobile vaccination units to villages and interior to facilitate vaccination in Orang Asli villages and among senior citizens, persons with disabilities (PwP) and the homeless.
The Prime Minister said the effort would not succeed without the thorough planning of the government and sacrifice of the frontliners as well as volunteers involved.
“From JKJAV, vaccinators, doctors, nurses to police, armed forces, RELA, civil defence force (APM) personnel as well as volunteers, thank you and congratulations for the dedication and hard work of all of you to ensure the largest vaccination programme in the history of the country is successfully implemented.
“To those who have received vaccine in the first and second phases of the Immunisation programme, I also thanked them for playing their roles in the effort to curb the pandemic,” he said.
He stressed that as a caring government, the government is always listening to the grievances and feedback of the people and is also making efforts to improve its capability in terms of planning, capacity and manpower to achieve the main objective which is herd immunity.
He said the government is committed and would strive to ensure the vaccination programme proceeded smoothly and orderly.
“I acknowledge there are still weaknesses which have to be improved and I am giving my commitment that the government would always improve the programme from time to time,” he said.
According to the immunisation programme, the implementation of the first phase of vaccination from February to April involved 500,000 frontliners including health personnel.
The second phase which started from April to August would involve 9.4 million senior citizens, vulnerable groups and persons with disabilities while the third phase scheduled from May this year to February 2022, involving individuals aged 18 and above, non-citizens with a target of 13.7 million people or more.
