Amid rising cases of COVID-19 infections and deaths, Putrajaya is mulling taking action against those are anti-vaccine.

Bernama quoted Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin saying that he had also told the COVID-19 Vaccine Supply Access Guarantee Special Committee (JKJAV) to look into the possibility of making vaccinations mandatory.

This, according to the premier, is necessary, as it is difficult to reach the government's target to achieve herd immunity by the end of this year, if the registrations for vaccination remain low.

"I hope we can speed up the vaccination process. What's important now is to have no one saying no to vaccination.

"We don't want only half (of the Malaysian population) get vaccinated, and the other half not (vaccinated), because it will have consequences," Bernama quoted the premier saying after visiting the vaccination centre (PPV) at the Malaysian International Trade and Exhibition Centre (MITEC) in Kuala Lumpur today.

Earlier this year, Khairy Jamaluddin, the coordinating minister of the National Immunization Program, had said that Putrajaya had no plans to make vaccination mandatory.

The police had also previously warned that they would take stern action those who incite others to not get vaccinated, and spread fake news about the vaccine.

According to Bernama, more than 3.3 million vaccine doses have been administered as of yesterday midnight.

Malaysia has recorded consistently high numbers of COVID-19 cases and deaths in the last few weeks.

Yesterday, 8,209 new infections and 103 deaths were recorded, bringing the total number of confirmed cases and fatalities in the country to 595,374, and 3,096, respectively.


Source: Bernama
Photo source: Harian Metro