THE government has yet to decide if it should make booster shots a condition for people to be considered fully vaccinated against Covid-19, said Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin.

He said the Health Ministry was currently studying the experiences of other countries which have made booster shots a condition for completely vaccinated status.

“Our experts are also looking into the effectiveness (of booster shots) and they will make recommendations to the Covid-19 Immunisation Task Force.

“If we find that the number of cases, hospitalisation rate and deaths are increasing due to the people’s reluctance to receive booster doses, and it becomes an international norm to require both primer series and booster shots to be considered full vaccinated, then we will make a similar decision…but (for now) we haven’t,” he said on Astro Awani’s Agenda Awani yesterday night.

Khairy said the government still recognised as fully vaccinated people those who have received two doses of the AstraZeneca, Sinovac and Pfizer vaccines.

However, Khairy said Malaysia could face a new wave of Covid-19 infections if the administration of booster doses is not accelerated.

“If the coverage for booster doses is not as high as those of the first and second doses, the number of cases, hospitalisation rate, and deaths will increase,” he said.

He pointed out that Israel had faced a third wave of Covid-19 despite having completed vaccinations in a short period of time.

“Israel may be the fastest in terms of completing their vaccination process and the number of cases and fatalities also declined after that, which shows the effectiveness of vaccination.

“However, after looking at the fact that there was a group that did not take the vaccine, coupled with a decline in vaccine efficacy, which led to a third wave, they (Israel) accelerated the administration of booster doses and today, the number of cases have declined again. They have become a leading indicator of what we need to do in Malaysia,” he said.

Meanwhile, Khairy said following the administration of 1.7 million Pfizer booster doses, most of the side effects that have been reported have been mild, such as sore arm and fever.

“Of the total (1.7 million doses), only 11 cases experienced serious side effects such as allergies but these have not resulted in serious hospital admissions so far,” he said.

Khairy said the government aimed to improve the booster dose uptake with education and information before  progressing to a more aggressive strategy. – Bernama, November 29, 2021.