I do not know what to say when vaccines can be extended the date of expiry

 

 

By Stephen Ng

 

Dr Siti Mariah Mahmud, state exco of Selangor in charge of healthcare, told me during the Covid-19 pandemic that Selangor was begging for the Covid vaccines.

            Without her permission, I have to tell my side of the story so that the Sultan of Selangor understands that the Selangor State Exco whom I respect a lot, worked very hard during the pandemic to deserve at least a credit mention.

She will pass on her state seat to her successor in the upcoming state election, but I hope more clones of Dr Siti can be produced.
            If His Royal Highness Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah would like a candidate whom he can honour, it is Dr Siti. Although we have not met in person, I could see that we have an altruistic politician who cares for the people.

            Over the phone, we discussed how to solve the problem in Selangor so that people could be protected against Covid-19. I was, at that point in time, helping an NGO to get their approval to set up a Covid centre, which I will also elaborate here in this piece because they are related.

            I told Dr Siti that the better solution is to get clinics to carry out the vaccination, instead of having the mass vaccination done in an enclosed air-conditioned environment, where the same air is recycled.

The network of clinics that we have has a wider reach compared to the centralised vaccination centres. We also discussed the use of mobile clinics which was suggested by a former cabinet minister.

            Dr Siti told me that the state was unable to get enough vaccines. It is not the infrastructure, it is the amount of vaccines given to the state which Sultan Sharafuddin, I believe, has touched on the same issue now that we know some 3 million doses may be discarded.

Extended Expiry?

            I would like to ask Health Director-General, Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah a few questions in public, since he has made a statement saying that “the shelf life of Covid-19 vaccines used in Malaysia has been extended after the manufacturing company submitted new data on the stability of the vaccine.” (The Edge Markets)

            I am sure these are some of the questions that the public want to know an answer to as well. I believe there are others with a high level of integrity and more knowledgeable, such as Dr Adeeba Kamarulzaman among others, who would volunteer their expertise to get to the bottom of things.

            The Covid pandemic, along with the propaganda that we have been bombarded from both ends of the spectrum, has already raised the doubts about the integrity of the sources of data we are provided.

            Before the disclosure by Prime Minister, Anwar Ibrahim, everything was kept silent. As the DG, should Dr Noor Hisham not be the one to raise the red flag when the wastage was of such a big quantum? Why the delay?

            We certainly do not expect his job as merely “a highly paid reporter on Covid statistics,” borrowing the words from a friend.

            Was Dr Noor Hisham unaware of the expiry of these vaccines all along? What if Anwar did not raise the red flag? Would these vaccines been disposed of when they could have been used by the people, or at least sent to other third world countries which needed them badly?

            Over the past six months, was there any major campaign carried out to go for the booster shots? Or were we waiting for another pandemic scare before a campaign is organised to utilise these vaccines before the expiry date?

            This has to do with the issue of procurement. I would like to know if an audit has been set up by the Auditor-General’s office because I remember every year, the reports seem to tell us that there is a lot of wastages but little efforts undertaken to address these issues highlighted by the auditors, or at least, we do not read about follow-up actions after that.

            I am not familiar with the vaccines but having us being told that, based on some “new data on the stability of the vaccine submitted by the manufacturing company,” now, the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA) has given conditional approval for the vaccines to be extended by another six months, it makes me ask more questions.

            May I suggest a task force be set up with the help of independent medical researchers to assess the data as claimed? I am sure without some form of assurance, many of us would still have some qualms about having the jabs.

             I wish all other perishables could have their expiry dates extended, but I just discarded half a bottle of oyster sauce yesterday because it was already foaming.

Back to Covid Quarantine Centre

            Allow me to go back to the Covid Quarantine Centre which the NGO wanted to set up. At a time when the country was in a state of emergency due to the virulence of the Delta variant, B40s had no place they could go to.

            The said NGO went through three months of being stonewalled. To my horror, I was told that there were seven or eight agencies checking on the suitability of the hotels to be set up as a quarantine centre.

            Under Business-As-Usual circumstances, the inspection by these agencies are supposed to ensure safety of the building before it can be used for a specific purpose. However, this is a state of emergency, and three months was far too long to wait.

            The NGO claimed that they wanted to set it up in Kuala Lumpur because Selangor did not give them the greenlight earlier. Of course, with a direct access to Dr Siti, I only had to message her to ask, and she immediately said she did not know about it. After all, the NGO could not produce a letter that showed they had applied to the state government for permission to set up the centre. I am inclined to trust Dr Siti’s words.

            After nearly two weeks of helping Dr Siti and the NGO to swing the Covid centre to Selangor, because she was desperately asking for it, I found a hotel and another row of shoplots offered by two different Tan Sri’s. Everyone was willing to assist in their own capacity.

            It was then that two health officers dropped a bombshell asking the two private hospitals to provide a letter of indemnity. I was told by the NGO coordinator that the hospitals immediately withdrew their support, and they were already at the verge of dropping the whole project.

            When told to Dr Noor Hisham, he would not even budge or help solve the problem at the ministry level. I do not want to go into disputes with him, but he should know what he could have done to resolve the issue.

            After all, even public hospitals would not offer any indemnity as we were experiencing a time when the Delta variant was virulent, why should a private hospital be asked to provide a letter of indemnity!

            My last resort was to appeal to the Seri Paduka Yang DiPertuan Agong via a Youtube post (my first public appearance) urging His Majesty to look into the plight of the B40 who had no place to go.

            Here was an NGO already with its sponsors, financial and manpower support, but they were faced with all the bureaucratic problems just set up the Covid quarantine centre for B40.

            This, of course, caught the attention of a cabinet minister who communicated with the Minister of Federal Territories, Annuar Musa who asked the cabinet minister to give me his personal contact.

            The rest is history. The next day, I was told that Annuar had called for a meeting with all the agencies, including the Health Department and the NGO. Within just a few hours, everything went smoothly.

            The next day I read that this hotel was included in the list of Quarantine centres that was set up by the Ministry of Federal Territories. Yet, when I requested that a B40 positive case in Selangor be placed there temporarily so that his mother, wife and sister can feel safe in the same apartment, the NGO claimed that they cannot take anyone from Selangor. Why?

            My friends and I ended up sponsoring a hotel room in Bandar Sunway for the family, and only after Subang Jaya state assemblyman, Michelle Ng’s team sanitised the apartment, did we allow them to return.

            Did Dr Noor Hisham know all this? Of course, he did. I have chosen not to engage with him privately to solve issues these days, when it could have been done privately; instead I have to bring this to the forefront. This is not done to shame him, but to ask him to do some self-reflection as someone who is in public service.

            Meanwhile, I will hold back my frustrations, and let others tell of their experiences of hospital bullying and other related issues affecting the management of our public health system.