TANJONG KARANG: There are more than 300,000 doses of Covid-19 vaccines yet to be administered in Selangor and the state needs to up its vaccination rate, says Khairy Jamaluddin.

       "As of June 27, Selangor has received 1,367,306 doses of Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Sinovac vaccines.

       "There is a remainder of 322,606 doses which have not been used.

       "This means that Selangor has achieved 76% usage of vaccines supplied.

       "That is why I have requested the state to speed up the vaccination process," he told reporters after opening a vaccination centre set up at Dewan Tan Sri Noh Omar here on Monday (June 28)

       He said that Selangor is the only state where the vaccination rate is below 80%.

       "Melaka has the highest rate of vaccination with 94% followed by Terengganu and Negeri Sembilan with 92%.

       "Other states have achieved over 80%, except for Selangor," he said.

       Khairy also denied Selangor Public Health Committee chairman Dr Siti Mariah Mahmud's claims that vaccine stocks in the state were running low.

       He said in a meeting with Selangor Mentri Besar Amirudin Shari two weeks ago, the state said it had the capacity of handling only 40,000 vaccinations a day.

       "I am not sure if she was present during the meeting. The supply of vaccines is based on this capacity.

       "I don't know where the state exco got her figure of 80,000 vaccinations from," he said.

       Dr Siti Mariah had claimed on Sunday (June 27) that some vaccination centres (PPVs) in Selangor would be forced to stop operations unless their stocks of vaccines was replenished.

       Khairy, who is also the coordinating minister for the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme, said that Selangor had increased its vaccination capacity from 16,000 a day on June 1 to about 44,000 as of June 25.

       "We are planning to increase the capacity to 130,000 a day in July, which the Mentri Besar has agreed to," he said, adding this was due to the increase in vaccination facilities, including mega vaccination centres, in the state.

       Meanwhile, Khairy said the Public-Private Partnership Industrial Covid-19 Immunisation Programme (Pikas) would be extended to cover workers in the construction industry next month.

       He also said that Pikas would also be extended to other states in July following the success of the pilot project here in Selangor.

       He said they would decide the amount of vaccines to be supplied under Pikas soon.

       Khairy also said this would not affect vaccine supply for the national immunisation programme.