Nearly 2.8 million vaccine doses stored at health ministry and Covid-19 storage facilities have expired as of Feb 28, said health minister Dr Zaliha Mustafa.
Zaliha said the 2,796,638 vaccine doses that expired made up 3.27% of the total number of vaccine doses acquired by the government.
In a written parliamentary reply to Wong Kah Woh (PH-Taiping) yesterday, she said the vaccine doses were of various brands and included contributions.
However, the government is unable to disclose specific details as it is bound by the vaccine manufacturers’ non-disclosure agreements (NDAs).
“This includes vaccine prices. Procurement costs for all vaccines have also been explained during the Public Accounts Committee’s (PAC) meeting on Aug 2, 2021,” she said.
Wong was the PAC chairman during the last (14th) Parliament session.
The Auditor-General’s Report on government expenditure in 2021, released last month, found that 1.1 million vaccine doses expired in April 2022 and were destroyed.
In a written parliamentary reply last March, then health minister Khairy Jamaluddin said the government ordered 88.1 million Covid-19 vaccine doses as of Feb 18, 2022, at a cost of RM4.72 billion.
The vaccines were enough to cover 143.13% (46.03 million) of the country’s adult, adolescent and child population.
The issue of expired vaccines was also highlighted by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim in January when he said Malaysia had five to six million doses left in stock after expired doses were destroyed because of poor demand. – FMT