Dr Annuar showing a slide of his survey during the live stream.
SIBU (Feb 18): Sibu Disaster Management Committee coordinator Dr Annuar Rapaee has expressed concern over the Covid-19 vaccination programme’s herd immunity target after a survey he conducted showed growing indecisiveness.
Some 44 per cent of the 26,716 respondents of his ongoing survey via Facebook had agreed to be vaccinated when the programme is rolled out in the country next week, down from 63.5 per cent of 11,579 respondents on Monday.
Dr Annuar pointed out that the number of respondents who were undecided was 39.4 per cent while those who disagreed was at 16.5 per cent. On Monday, 26.9 per cent were on the fence and 9.5 per cent disagreed.
The Nangka assemblyman said with only 44 per cent of people agreeing to be vaccinated, the percentage was too low in ensuring the success of the vaccination programme.
“The federal government has targeted that 80 per cent of the population in Malaysia be vaccinated to ensure the programme will be successful in creating herd immunity, thus curbing the spread of the virus.
“So, I want to urge that almost 40 per cent of people who is still undecided to make up your mind, so that we can achieve at least 70 per cent of the people being vaccinated,” he said in a Facebook live stream on the Covid-19 situation here this evening.
Dr Annuar allayed the public’s concerns on the safety of the Covid-19 vaccine used in the country, adding that the claim that the vaccine was not halal was untrue.
He also explained that vaccines train the immune system to produce the antibody to fight a virus, thus the protection would last for decades and even a lifetime.
Dr Annuar said in general, vaccines consist of four components namely, antigen, adjuvant, preservatives and stabilizers.
He also explained that there were different types of vaccines including inactivated vaccines, live attenuated vaccines, subunit vaccines and toxoid vaccines.
“For the Covid-19 vaccine, it is a new vaccine which is a mRNA vaccine to protect against infectious diseases,” he pointed out.
Dr Annuar added that the vaccine would not disrupt the nucleus that is inside an individual’s DNA.
“Although it is a new vaccine, the concept of how the vaccine works is the same as other vaccines. This new vaccine is using mRNA vaccines that give instructions for our cells to make a harmless piece of what is called the ‘spike protein’.
“The spike protein is found on the surface of the virus that causes Covid-19. In fighting Covid-19, our cells will have the memory to fight against these spikes,” he said.
He also said under the Malaysian National Immunisation Programme (NIP), the government provides various vaccines to children to protect them from childhood diseases which include Rubella, Measle, Polio, and Tetanus.
Dr Annuar also said that he would give more details on the vaccines in the next live stream.
Malaysia is acquiring six types of vaccines with the Pfizer-Biontech Covid-19 vaccine to be launched first.
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