Dr Sim Kui Hian
KUCHING (June 15): With the approval of Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine to be safe and efficacious for those age 12 years and above, the state can safely vaccinate those age group in order to achieve herd immunity, said Local Government and Housing Minister Dato Sri Dr Sim Kui Hian.
In a Facebook post today, he said that once the state has vaccinated all the eligible Sarawakian above 18 years old, and still could not achieve the 70 per cent needed for herd immunity, it can safely vaccinate those between 12 to 18 years old.
“Pfizer is safe and efficacious for 12 years old and above, the only vaccine approved for this age group at the moment.
“While we are just starting to scale up vaccination for those eligible above 18 years old (on target to complete by August), because of Sarawak’s population demographic, we need to vaccinate 99 per cent of Sarawakians above 18 years old in order to achieve herds immunity of more than 70 per cent. The United States and some countries aim for more 80 per cent because of concern ( on the airborne virus),” he said.
Dr Sim pointed out that although the severity and death are worse in the elderly population, looking at the trend this year, up to 20 per cent of Covid-19 cases are below 20 years old.
“Young may not have severe symptoms but with more and more long Covid being identified, the damage to health by Covid-19 to our young people, which has many years to live, remains unknown,” he said.
On another note, Dr Sim said that the approval of two additional vaccines by the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Authority (NPRA), namely CanSino and Johnson & Johnson, will have enormous implications and impact for Sarawak, especially those rural areas where accessibility is challenging.
“Both only need single dose vaccination. Single dose will also greatly speed up and complete our vaccination process in Sarawak,” he said.
Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah informed today that the Covid-19 vaccines from China’s CanSino Biologics and the US’ Johnson & Johnson have been given conditional approval for use in the country.
He said the decision was made during the 359th Drug Control Authority (DCA) meeting today, where it also approved the usage of Pfizer-BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine in the country for those aged 12 years old and above.