A nurse prepares a shot of the Sinovac’s CoronaVac Covid-19 vaccine at a nursing home in Ankara, Turkey January 19, 2021. ― Reuters pic
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KUALA LUMPUR, May 19 — The Petra Group said today it will proceed with its plan to donate 200,000 doses of the Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine for vulnerable groups but distanced itself from other such initiatives after Khairy Jamaluddin exposed a “bogus” offer to the Penang government.
The group’s chief government liaison officer Datuk Dr William Stevenson said that the group disclosed to National Immunisation Programme coordinating minister Khairy during a meeting that it may be able to procure the vaccines directly and was seeking guidance on the proper channels and methods to do so.
“In the meeting conducted virtually, we reiterated our sincerity in making the vaccines available to the most vulnerable groups.
“We also emphasised that we are offering the vaccines for free with no strings attached and that this is not a commercial arrangement,” Stevenson said in a statement.
He said the group understood the minister’s need to conduct due diligence amid the emergence of bogus offers to donate vaccines, and stressed that it and the Vinod Sekhar Trust were not associated with any other parties offering vaccines.
“In sourcing for vaccines, we too have conducted the necessary checks on the manufacturer and distributor to ensure the vaccines are genuine. We believe the distributors we are in touch with are genuine,” he said
He said the group had written to Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Adham Baba, Khairy and the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA) once each to express their desire to contribute the vaccines.
“We also explained to the minister that once the government is satisfied that our offer ticks all the right boxes, we will make the necessary arrangements and formalities to obtain the approvals needed to bring in the vaccines.
“We are encouraged by the minister’s assurance that he will help facilitate the distribution of the vaccines once we have provided all the necessary documents to support our procurement from the manufacturer via an approved distributor,” he said.
He added that Khairy has asked the group to communicate directly with him to help bring about the donation of the vaccines.
“We thank Khairy for his help and advice. And we also appreciate the enormous responsibility he shoulders as Chairman of the Covid Immunisation Task Force (CITF).
“We look forward to working closely with his office in ensuring the speedy arrival of these doses of Sinovac,” he said.
Yesterday, the Covid-19 Immunisation Task Force disclosed that it found no evidence that the Sekhar Foundation has ordered, purchased or made inquiries with the Chinese manufacturer of Sinovac or the local distributor here.
The CITF said it has no issues with such donations so long as the proper channels were used.