KUCHING: Malaysia is projected to experience a continuous rise in Covid-19 cases until mid-March next year hitting over 5,000 infections daily from Feb 25th, said Bandar Kuching MP Dr Kelvin Yii.
Citing projections from the US-based Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation’s (IHME), he said if there is no urgent intervention, the country may see the healthcare system overwhelmed again by April or June.
“That is why a whole-of-society approach is needed. The National Vaccine Roadmap that is being developed by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (Mosti) must be properly scrutinised and receives the necessary inputs from different stakeholders.
“This includes input from politicians of two divides so that there is a joint collaboration to exemplify and coordinate communications to make sure this vaccine reaches its intended target and that no one get left behind regardless of their status, demographics or background,” he said in a Facebook post today.
He said thus the bi-partisan Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) on Health, Science and Innovation plays an important role to scrutinise and give input especially on the approach taken by the government to handle Covid-19 including procurement and distribution of the vaccine that is scheduled to first arrive the earliest in February next year.
“Since the announcement of the formation of the new PSC, I have been in contact with the Speaker of the House to push for this PSC to convene a meeting swiftly and get down to work due to urgency and huge public interest on the matter,” he said.
He said it is pertinent that the PSC is properly briefed on the updates and progress of the Covid-19 vaccine procurement and even distribution plan by Mosti in the spirit of transparency.
“Since a Belgian minister’s accidental exposure of Covid-19 vaccine prices, there were many questions raised by different parties on the actual cost to our country whether there are possible leakages and whether we are getting the best deal from the RM3 billion that was allocated by the federal government to help vaccinate at least 70 percent of our population in order to achieve herd immunity,” he said.
Dr Yii, who is also in the PSC, said Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Khairy Jamaluddin had made clarifications on the procurement of the vaccine in Parliament recently.
“But there will still be continuous question throughout the process and the best platform for the ministry to provide such accountability and transparency will be to the PSC on Health, Science and Innovation as they are empowered by Parliament to call up those involved and scrutinise the whole process to make sure that it reaches it intended target and minimise risk of corruption, wastage or abuse.
“With more transparency and accountability, we can then increase public confidence on the vaccine and curb misinformation, confusion and hesitancy which will definitely affect the government’s mass vaccination plans to make sure it reaches its intended target and also, we are not left behind compared to other countries without compromising on the safety and security of our people,” he pointed out.
He added PSC is empowered to call up different stakeholders including people from the ministry, different healthcare associations, research institutes, private medical fraternities, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and many others to provide their input into the country’s Covid-19 approach.
