THE number of registrations for Covid-19 vaccination is far from the intended target and the government has to increase its efforts, coordinating minister for the National Immunisation Programme Khairy Jamaluddin said.

The Science, Technology, And Innovation Minister said one reason could be that registration channels are not accessible enough yet. Many people might also be having a wait-and-see attitude.

“As of 11am, 1,468,137 people have registered through MySejahtera to receive the vaccine and in terms of percentage of the population, that is only 6.1%.

“So this is a relatively low level of registration and we need to increase efforts to get more people to register,” he said in a press conference today.

The government has targeted the inoculation of 26.6 million Malaysians, or 80% of the population, to create herd immunity that will curb the spread of Covid-19 in the country.

“I believe the registration figure will increase after May when we open the hotline and also when all government hospitals and health clinics are already opening registration counters,” the minister said.

“Secondly, it is the wait-and-see attitude by the public. We expected this but I am sure when more people, especially the front liners, receive their vaccines, the public will be more confident and start registering.”

As at 11am, the total number of individuals who have been vaccinated is 17,064.

“In terms of the top five districts with the highest implementation of their vaccinations, the highest is Kuching district which has given 1,677 doses, followed by Sibu (1,360), Kinta (1,141), Kuantan (1,075), and lastly, Mukah (822).

“The three states that have the most vaccinations are Sarawak with 7,402 vaccinations given, the second state is Pahang, 2,419, and Perak with 1,233.

“We will update every day the vaccination statistics broken down by states.”

Khairy said the task force will continue to monitor the statistics from time to time.

Malaysia began the first of its three-phase, year-long immunisation programme on February 24. – March 1, 2021.