THE government will sign a Covid-19 vaccine procurement contract with Johnson & Johnson from the United States soon, says Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Khairy Jamaluddin.

He said so far, the clinical information on this vaccine has been positive and based on the recommendation of the Covid-19 Vaccine Supply Access Guarantee Special Committee (JKJAV), the cabinet decided to purchase the vaccine.

“We are still in the discussion process and I understand that Health Minister Dr Adham Baba will soon sign a contract for Malaysia to procure the vaccine from Johnson & Johnson.

“….and only after that will we send the vaccine to the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA) for evaluation.”

Khairy said this at a news conference on the National COVID-19 Immunisation Programme in Putrajaya today.

“The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is a single-dose vaccine,” he said.

Meanwhile, on two-dose vaccines, Khairy said that under the JKJAV’s policy, the second dose of the vaccine would be safely stored for those who have received the first dose.

“We are following the suggestion of vaccine supplier, Pfizer, that the second dose be given 21 days after the first.

“We do not want to take the United Kingdom’s approach of extending the time for the second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine from one month to nine or up to 12 weeks,” he added.

The two-dose vaccines are produced by companies such as Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZeneca, Sinovac Life Sciences Co Ltd (Sinovac) and CanSinoBIO, while the one-dose type comes from Sputnik V, besides Johnson & Johnson. – Bernama, February 17, 2021.