RODRIGO Duterte has been called many names since he took over as Philippine president five years ago for his unorthodox ways of running his country. One that perhaps aptly describes him is “a maverick”.
This former mayor of Davao City is the first president from Mindanao, the Southern region of the country that has been having its cultural, religious and armed conflict for 52 years now.
But true to his out-of-the-box style, Duterte this week announced his administration’s policy not to reveal vaccine brands to be used in inoculation sites against the Covid-19 pandemic, something which is widely done in Malaysia. I, for one, take my hat off to him for this bold move.
Duterte ordered a stop to the announcement of vaccine brands to avoid congestion arising from people’s preference for a certain brand.
He decided on this after scores of people flocked to a shopping mall and failed to observe proper distancing as a protocol during the pandemic in an attempt to get the Pfizer vaccine.
From now on in the Philippines, an individual would only be informed of the brand at the vaccination site and can still refuse to have it.
The brand-agnostic policy would help in preventing crowds and also convince people to get whatever vaccine available, said Rabindra Abeyasinghe, the World Health Organisation (WHO) representative to the Philippines. The organisation quickly came out in support of this policy by Duterte.
“This is a correct step in the right direction because this will help us to manage these kinds of superspreader events from happening and will also encourage people to accept the vaccines that are being rolled out,” said Abeyasinghe.
The WHO official also sends an important message that we in Malaysia should seriously take note of as there has been too much time-wasting and energy-sapping debate on the efficacy of vaccine A, B or C in our own backyard here.
“It does not matter which brand an individual would receive as all Covid-19 vaccines are effective in preventing deaths and severe disease,” said Abeyasinghe.
For the record, the vaccines that are being used now have all been approved by the WHO itself.
His commonsensical remark on this is exactly what I have been telling friends via several WhatsApp groups that I am affiliated with upon getting toxic texts that cast doubts on this or that type of vaccine.
I asked them, too, to stop viralling mainly such fake news and instead use their common sense.
What such information that bad-mouths on vaccines or vaccine brands amounts to is further slowdown of our already sluggish pace of vaccination, which as of now is reportedly well behind schedule, especially with the exponentially rising statistics of new infections.
Our Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah has warned that at the rate the pandemic is spreading, the next two weeks will be critical and people must prepare for the worst.
“The rise in cases started on April 1 and could trigger a vertical surge. We must prepare for the worst. Please help us by staying at home. Only together can we break the chain of infection,” he appealed.
By common sense, I mean like what the WHO official alluded to, what does it matter what type of vaccine we will be jabbed with when vaccination is the most effective means to protect each and everyone of us from being infected with the virus and equally critical, from infecting others.
The insensitive manner in which people resort to what could be described as “vaccine politics or politicking” reminds me of an article in The Times of London under the obituary column.
It’s not an obituary as a tribute to someone’s death but it mourned the death of common sense.
It’s incumbent upon all stakeholders to do whatever is necessary and doable to speed up Malaysia’s vaccination programme.
Malaysian Medical Association president Datuk Dr M. Subramaniam said that at the rate we are going we will never reach the target of vaccinating at least 80% of the population, as well as achieving the herd immunity objective.
This is indeed a gloomy scenario what with rampant reports of people still very lax in observing “self-lockdown” by staying home as much as possible.
It’s comforting to see that even PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang has also come out lately urging Muslims to give full support to the government in the ongoing vaccination programme.
He criticised religious preachers who had been issuing views against the vaccination, saying that Islam prioritises protecting lives above all other matters to the extent that some things that are normally haram or prohibited in Islam are given exception just for the sake of protecting lives. This includes a medical emergency.
It’s also probably due to doubts being spread on this, or that vaccine, that a whopping 10,000 people didn’t show up for their vaccination appointments in Kelantan recently.
According to latest media reports, the number of no-shows at vaccination centres has swelled to 30,000 with two more states – Kedah and Perak – added to the list.
The Kelantanese are known for their strong religious convictions and it’s just mind-boggling to think that they have squandered in large numbers this golden opportunity of saving lives, like what Hadi Awang was referring to.
This prompted Cabinet minister Datuk Seri Mustapa Mohamed, himself a Kelantanese, to say that this apathy should not recur.
Moving forward, it must be all hands on deck to ramp up the vaccination programme. It should be priority number one.
Comments: letters@thesundaily.com
