KOTA KINABALU – On top of the slow vaccine registration drive, Sabah also appears to have a low take-up rate on the Covid-19 inoculation.
Sabah DAP leaders revealed today that health authorities are finding trouble to finish even the 600 doses available for the Kota Kinabalu area.
Party secretary-general Chan Foong Hin said he had received messages, saying that the authorities had to reach out to others in order to finish the doses.
Registration for the vaccination for those above 18 in Sabah stood at 14%, the lowest in the country.
“The Sabah government should do more in getting people to register and get their vaccines. They must take proactive steps to address this problem,” said the Kota Kinabalu MP told reporters here today.
Chan said if Sabah were to source her own vaccines the leaders need to be certain of two things.
Firstly, whether there are any takers; and secondly, whether Sabah has the finances to buy its own vaccines, he said.
Meanwhile, Sabah DAP Luyang Assemblyman Phoong Jin Zhe said the state government should be able to source its own vaccines, similarly like Sarawak.
“This is because Sabah is so huge with wide and rugged terrains, the health authorities should go to them and make sure those in the far-flung areas are vaccinated,” he said.
Phoong said even the 600 doses allotted for the city did not meet the target, and this was why the state government needed to do more.
He noted under the Warisan-Plus government previously, it did not wait for Putrajaya to distribute the protection gears and also sanitisers, instead the leaders go out and source them from other countries.
Phoong noted the new government should emulate the same and not wait for Putrajaya which is dragging its feet on distributing the vaccines.
“We can actually deal with the low registration and vaccine take up without relying on Putrajaya,” he said. – The Vibes, April 24, 2021
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