Malaysia’s vaccination continues to pick up pace this week with 1.5m doses administered, as daily jabs surge past 260,000

KUALA LUMPUR (June 26): Malaysia’s Covid-19 vaccination programme continues to speed up this week, with more than 230,000 daily shots given out in the last four consecutive days, compared with 200,000 doses before that.

Putrajaya previously targeted 200,000 doses per day in July, and 300,000 a day by August.

On Thursday, daily jabs reached its new highest on record of 268,604, up from Wednesday's 252,773 shots, Tuesday's 250,529 shots and Monday's 235,623 shots.

The country delivered 1.49 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines this week — up 21.14% from the prior week's 1.23 million shots. In the week before that, 772,500 shots were administered.

The latest weekly doses administered make up 21.85% of the 6.82 million cumulative shots given since Malaysia's vaccination plan started on Feb 24.

As of June 24, 1.9 million individuals have received their second vaccine dose — meaning they are now fully inoculated — representing a vaccination rate of 5.8% out of the country's population of 32.72 million.

Meanwhile, 4.92 million got their first vaccine dose, according to the latest data released by The Special Committee on Covid-19 Vaccine Supply Access Guarantee (JKJAV).

Malaysia stands third in ASEAN with highest vaccination rate

In ASEAN, Singapore leads with the highest vaccination rate of 36.14%, as 2.06 million people in the country with a population of 5.7 million are now inoculated, according to the Financial Times' Covid-19 Tracker.

This is followed by Cambodia at 16.74% (2.76 million have gotten second dose out of population of 16.49 million), Malaysia at 5.8%, Indonesia at 4.67% (12.64 million out of population of 270.6 million), Thailand at 3.3% (2.3 million out of population of 69.63 million), and Brunei at 2.89% (12,524 out of population of 433,285).

Malaysia has received 8.6 million Covid-19 vaccines as of June 21, according to data provided by the Covid-19 Immunisation Task Force (CITF). These include 828,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines, 4.08 million of Pfizer vaccines and 3.69 million doses of Sinovac vaccines.

Coordinating Minister of the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme Khairy Jamaluddin said on Thursday that the private sector vaccination programme in the country is expected to start in August. The private vaccination market in the country has been delayed due to limited global Covid-19 vaccine supply, he said.

Reuters, meanwhile, reported that Japan is making arrangements to donate one million doses each of the AstraZeneca vaccine to Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines.

Covid-19 weekly infections decline to 37,445, but fatalities rise

Malaysia logged a total of 37,445 new Covid-19 infections from June 19 until June 25 this week – down 4% from last week’s 38,993 cases. The seven-day moving average of daily cases fell to 5,351, from last Friday's 5,542.

The new cases were discovered from the screening of 514,138 people nationwide this week, down 9.43% from 567,681 last week.

To date, 14.2 million individuals have been tested since the pandemic began last year.

A total of 42,413 recoveries were recorded this week – down 17.72% from 51,547 in the week before. But as weekly recoveries outpace new infections, active cases that carry transmission risks were trimmed to 60,117 from 65,602 as of last Friday.

Covid-19 related fatalities climbed to 527 this week, compared with 508 previously.

As for those needing intensive care, these total 870, down from last Friday's 894.

A total of 657,739 people have recovered from the cumulative 722,659 infections found in Malaysia so far, representing a recovery rate of 91%.

Klang Valley reports 16,697 cases this week

The Klang Valley – comprising Selangor, Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya – recorded 16,697 infections this week, down 2.4% from 17,116 in the prior week.

Selangor has 12,963 cases, down from 12,941 the week before; Kuala Lumpur recorded 3,661 cases versus last week’s 4,111; and Putrajaya has 73 cases (up from 64 previously).

Selangor remains the worst hit state in the country with the most Covid-19 infections at 237,307, followed by Kuala Lumpur (73,967), Johor (69,370) and Sabah (68,388).

According to the Health Ministry, the basic reproduction number (R-naught or R0) for Covid-19 infections nationwide now stands at 0.98.

The R0 is the effective reproduction number of the disease and projects the average number of people that each new Covid-19 patient will infect. An R0 of less than 1.0 means the infection is not spreading.

Selangor and Sarawak both recorded the highest R0 at 0.99, followed by Labuan (0.98), Melaka (0.97), Kuala Lumpur (0.95) and Kedah (0.95).

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