The Health Ministry will no longer administer first doses of Covid-19 vaccines to children aged five to 11 beginning May 16.
As such, Deputy Health Minister Dr Noor Azmi Ghazali said parents who are still undecided on getting their children vaccinated must decide before that date.
He also urged parents to register their children for vaccination via the MySejahtera app by May 8, in order to secure vaccination appointments ahead of the cut-off date.
“I urge parents who have yet to make a decision not to miss this opportunity to get free vaccination through PICKids before the first dose closing date.
“Choose to vaccinate your children to avoid severe Covid-19 complications,” he said in a statement today.
Children born in 2017 who have yet to reach the age of five on May 15 are not affected by this decision.
They may still register for vaccination via MySejahtera and details will be announced soon, said Noor Azmi, who heads the government’s National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme for Children (PICKids).
He said the Covid-19 Immunisation Task Force for Children (CITF-C) decided on the closing date due to low uptake for the Comirnaty and Coronavac vaccines being offered by the government, which could result in wastage when unused vaccines reach their expiry date.
To avoid this, the government will no longer offer either vaccine as first doses for children aged five to below 12, beginning May 16.
This means Pfizer’s Comirnaty vaccine will no longer be available to this age group whether from government or private healthcare facilities after May 15. Sinovac’s Coronavac will still be available for purchase at private facilities.
Noor Azmi (above) said that as of yesterday, only 1,371,120 children have received the first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, which is 38.6 percent of the eligible population. About 4,500 first doses were administered per day over the past week.
According to the Health Ministry’s data repository on Github, a total of 49 children in this age group have died of Covid-19 since the beginning of the pandemic up to April 12 this year.
None of them ever received a Covid-19 vaccine, and this includes 17 who died this year.
This is despite children generally having a lower risk of severe Covid-19 disease compared to adults.
Last month, the Health Ministry also reported a spike in paediatric ICU admissions for Covid-19. It had also warned of multi-system inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) and other Covid-19 complications observed in children.
Meanwhile, Noor Azmi said the CITF-C also decided to amend a clause in the vaccination consent form for children below 18.
The new form will no longer contain the clause:
“2. I am responsible for any risk that may happen to my child as a result of my decision/action because the benefits of vaccination are far better than its side effects.”
The deputy minister said the clause is removed to “avoid confusion” and is in line with the ministry’s existing practice of always being prepared to provide medical assistance for vaccine side effects. - Mkini
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