KUCHING: The Ministry of Health (MOH) and Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) have been urged to expedite the Covid-19 vaccination process for adolescent children.
In making this call, Bandar Kuching MP Dr Kelvin Yii said that while he is glad that vaccination among adolescents has started in Sarawak, it has to be expedited in order to protect them in view of the current surge of Delta variant cases in Sarawak.
“This may potentially cause the next Delta wave to be among our children that are yet to be vaccinated,” he said in a Facebook post yesterday (Sept 13).
He then said even though Sarawak has a high vaccination rate among its adult population, the total population coverage is only about 64 percent.
While rate of severe symptoms and hospitalisation among the Covid-19 cases is not so high, but with the high infection rate of the Delta variant, it leaves the children and unvaccinated vulnerable exposed.
For convenience and to avoid congestion in specific PPVs, he also stressed that children should be allowed to be vaccinated in their own schools or that special vaccination centres (PPVs) should be opened in as many schools as possible.
“This makes it easier to track children getting the vaccines based on school records, including those that have dropped out from school,” he said.
Dr Yii said if vaccination for all 12 to 17 years old can be done this month, the state then can have a total vaccination coverage of 83.4 percent.
“Then, we can further plan to vaccinate those below 12 based on available data especially in view of re-opening of schools,” he said.
