KUALA LUMPUR, May 27 — Putrajaya may start imposing fines on those who do not show up for their Covid-19 vaccination appointments.

Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Adham Baba said his ministry is in discussions with the National Security Council (NSC) regarding this matter after reports emerged that more than 52,000 individuals across seven states have missed their appointments to date.

During an online press conference, Dr Adham said the Health Ministry is worried about the new variants that are emerging in the recent high number of positive cases.

Malaysia has been hitting record numbers of infections since the Hari Raya Aidilfitri holidays and Dr Adham said the variants first detected in Nigeria, the United Kingdom, South Africa and India are already in the community.

Today, Utusan Malaysia reported that more than 50,000 individuals had missed their appointments nationwide, with Kedah registering more than 20,000 missed appointments.

"The public must realise this vaccine is free and its rollout is being done in stages. It is the Health Ministry's duty to obtain these vaccines and it has a delivery schedule.

"We get Pfizer from their own suppliers in Belgium, Sinovac is using Pharmaniaga for their fill and finish process, and AstraZeneca is from the Covac facility.

"We are also about to procure vaccines from Gamelaya Sputnik and CanSigno, which I believe will then speed up our vaccination roll out.

"That’s why we feel applying penalties and mandatory vaccination must be implemented once all voluntary avenues like online registration, by MySejahtera or doing face-to-face appointments fail,” he said during a press conference today.

Adding to that, Adham said more vaccines are set to arrive in June and July, following which he feels the vaccine rollout process will be smoother and faster.

He also asked for non-governmental organisations to help the government with outreach once these vaccines arrive.