Dr Boo Suggests Govt Trade Expired Vaccines For New Doses

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A former lawmaker has proposed the government negotiate with pharmaceutical companies to trade Malaysia’s huge stock of expired Covid-19 vaccines with the latest vaccines at a lower procurement price.
Dr Boo Cheng Hau pointed out it would be unethical to use the nearly 2.8 million expired doses which could be potentially harmful to the recipients, as well as ultimately being ineffective against new Covid-19 variants.
“In the midst of Acturus and other variants that may render the first-generation vaccine ineffective or less effective, the Health Ministry needs to procure the latest second-generation vaccines, of preferably bivalent or multiple-valent, to cover protection for a wide range of virus strains.
“The Health Ministry could negotiate with pharmaceutical companies to trade in the expired stock of vaccines in exchange for lower procured prices for the latest vaccines.
“And the pharmaceutical companies would usually allow a lower procurement price according to the number of doses traded in and based on humanitarian and compassionate grounds,” he said on Facebook.
The former Skudai assemblyperson added that the positive Covid test rate in Malaysia has increased to 15.5 percent in the last two weeks during the post-festive season, coupled with a slight hike in hospitalisation, ventilated, and ICU cases.
“But it is much more manageable now than the pandemic period, which could well be attributed to a successful rollout of the vaccination programme,” Boo said.
Malaysia initially expected to receive Covid-19 bivalent vaccines in January but Health Minister Dr Zaliha Mustafa said a month later that her ministry is still negotiating with Pfizer for the supply.
On Friday, the World Health Organization said Covid-19 no longer represents a global health emergency after about three years and more than 6.9 million deaths. - Mkini

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