SEREMBAN: It is safe to permit interstate travel once the country achieves its 90 per cent adult vaccination rate.
Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said the ministry viewed this target as sufficient to lift the interstate travel ban.
He said as long as people strictly observed the standard operating procedures (SOP), Malaysia would be able to curb the spread of Covid-19.
"It is true that the vaccination rate of the total population stands at 65 per cent, but most teenagers have already completed two doses of the vaccine and this will further increase the population coverage to 70 per cent.
"If we do not allow interstate travels, this will cause various problems in terms of mental and emotional stress because some of us have not been able to visit our parents and family members for a year.
"That is why we set the 90 per cent target for the adult population because we feel this is the level we are comfortable with to allow interstate travels," he said during a press conference after officiating the Children's Ward and launched the MRI Machine as well as the ISO 9001: 2015 Certification at the Mawar Medical Center (MMC), here, today.
Present were Negri Sembilan Health, Environment, Cooperatives and Consumerism Action Committee Chairman, S. Veerapan and MMC Chairman, Datuk Lee Tian Hock.
Khairy was commenting on the views from several health experts who believed that lifting the ban on interstate travel and relaxing more restrictions during the National Recovery Plan should only be done after 90 per cent of the total population are fully immunised.
Elaborating further, Khairy said the government could not possibly wait too long, until 90 per cent of the total population to be vaccinated, because 20 per cent of the population involved teenagers under 12 years old.
The Rembau Member of Parliament said if such action was taken, it would probably take until middle of next year before the government could allow people to cross state borders.
"Therefore, I think with the complete and extensive vaccination coverage among adults reaching 65 per cent (of the total population), it is sufficient (to reopen interstate travels).
"I need to trust Malaysians to abide by every SOP and adopt the new norms, in an effort to curb Covid-19."
He said the ministry hoped that those who planned on returning to see their elderly parents would undertake self-testing.
"We want to open safely. If we want to wait until the population is 90 per cent, we have to wait too long."
On Covid-19 antiviral drugs, Khairy said his ministry would procure from various companies, similar to how it was done with the Covid-19 vaccine.
He said the ministry would not only procure the drug from only one company, but also look for other antiviral drugs in the treatment against Covid-19 manufactured by other pharmaceutical companies.
"As we have obtained various Covid-19 vaccines, we could also buy more than one brand of antiviral drugs, but we will study it from the aspect of safety and effectiveness," he said. - NST
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