KUALA LUMPUR – The effectiveness and safety of Covid-19 vaccines have been an issue of hot debate among Malaysians, especially since the country will receive its first batch of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine by end of this month.
Following this, the Public Health Society, under the Malaysian Medical Association, has come out with “Infovax”, a community education and awareness series on Covid-19 vaccines to clear all doubts.
National Cancer Society managing director Dr M. Murallitharan said there is a lot of concern on whether the vaccines are effective and safe, even among health professionals.
“These two – effectiveness and safety – are the two main worries among the people as a lot of us are hinging on this vaccine to be effective in making the pandemic recede, and slowly return to a normal life.
“If a lot of people refuse to take the vaccine, we will face a huge challenge in terms of ending the Covid-19 pandemic, which is why we came out with the Infovax initiative.”
Dr Murallitharan said Infovax is an ongoing project, which currently runs on one news portal, and will expand in terms of materials to be shared to the public in different languages, as well as starting online Facebook sessions.
The doctor said there will always be a risk-benefit when it comes to any kind of drug and medication, and this includes vaccines.
For example, he said, a lot of people use medicine, such as paracetamol, on a daily basis, but it does cause some people to have allergic reactions, some severe.
“With every other drug and vaccine, not only for the Covid-19 vaccine, there will be a group of people who are allergic. For these people, we already have a documented history of their allergies, and we will be very careful when giving them the shots.”
On February 4, Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme will start at the end of this month, with the government targeting 80% of the country’s population, or 26.5 million individuals, receiving the vaccine, which will be given for free, in three phases. – Bernama, February 11, 2021
