KOTA KINABALU: Sabah State Government is upscaling its vaccination rollout plan in effort to achieve the herd immunity by the end of 2021.
Towards this end, the Sabah State Government has chosen its wholly owned investment arm, Qhazanah Sabah Group, to be the assisting body to ensure sufficient and fast deployment of vaccine.
Qhazanah Sabah has answered this call whereby the Chairman Datuk Seri Panglima Dr. Md. Salleh Said Keruak, has announced the procurement of vaccine is in the process.
“It is because of our duty to serve the Government, Qhazanah Group, through our wholly-owned subsidiary namely WH Medicare, has committed to procure Sinovac CoronaVac vaccine from Pharmaniaga LifeScience Sdn. Bhd.
As the Chairman of Qhazanah, I am honoured and I thank State government for choosing Qhazanah to assist.” Salleh said.
The purchase of vaccine has been confirmed in the signing ceremony on Supply and Distribution Agreement (SDA) between WH Medicare Sdn. Bhd. and Pharmaniaga LifeScience Sdn. Bhd. on 6th August (Friday) at Pusat Pentadbiran Negeri Sabah (PPNS).
The signing between both parties were witnessed by Minister of Local Government and Housing, Datuk Seri Panglima Masidi Bin Manjun and Chairman of Qhazanah Sabah Group.
The agreement guarantees the purchase of 250,000 doses that can cater to 125,000 patients. This purchase addresses the challenges stated by Masidi, who is also the Finance Minister II, during the signing ceremony on the two factors that will affect efficiency of vaccine rollout.
“The two challenges we face are capacity to vaccinate and sufficient supply of vaccine that will be delivered according to a fixed schedule.” said Masidi.
Currently, Sabah is focused on implementing Enhanced Movement Control order (EMCO) on affected area and this measure has manage to controlled the number of infection cases compared to the rest of the states in Malaysia. However, this measure brings to an additional challenge that ties to the temporary stop on economic activities of the people.
This brings the upscaling of vaccination rollout to an utmost priority in the State’s agenda. Vaccination is the best global guarantee to co-exist with the Covid-19 virus where the main function is to reduce the likelihood of severe stage infection and hence reduces the risk of death. Achieving herd immunity is the best way for the Government to continue serving its social obligation to protect the people whilst ensuring that the economic activities would not cease completely and livelihood of the people will not be adversely affected.
Sabah has recorded, in 2nd August, that 907,248 out of registered population have successfully received the first dose. However, the increase in daily cases remains and herd immunity has to be achieved in order to tackle both safety net and economic challenges of the people.
When asked about the schedule delivery, the Qhazanah Chairman responded by mentioning that the important feature that the Group was looking at before agreeing to procure is efficiency of supply.
“This is why we chose Pharmaniaga LifeScience as our partner. The product is filled and finished in the factory here in Malaysia where logistics and distribution will be less of an issue. What matters is the vaccine is available when and as we need them. This is what we are offering to the State.” said Salleh.
During the signing, Masidi urged big companies to get their employees vaccinated. He said it is reasonable to allow companies to operate on a 100 per cent capacity if all the eligible employees and their family members are vaccinated.
Masidi also acknowledged the pressing needs to re-open economic activities and hence all measures will be taken to facilitate this.
“Through Qhazanah, Sabah State now has accessibility to vaccine supply. The rollout for this vaccine supply will be brought forward to the Cabinet for further discussion and refinement.” said Masidi.
The Chairman of the Group responded positively to this initiative and said that WH Medicare will work closely with the Sabah State Government.
“Qhazanah Sabah, through WH Medicare, is ready to play and active role in assisting the Government to implement measure that will enable the people of Sabah to live safely in this time of uncertainty. After all, it is our collective responsibility to assist each other.” Salleh added.
Also present in the signing were Permanent Secretary for Ministry of Finance, Tuan Hj Rusdin Riman; Executive Director for Qhazanah Sabah Sdn. Bhd., Tuan Hj. Mohd Shukor Bin Abdul Mumin and Chairman for WH Medicare Sabah Sdn. Bhd., Datuk Dr. Johnson Tee.
