KUALA LUMPUR, May 23 — The second round of the opt-in AstraZeneca vaccination program was met with several hiccups within seconds of its going “live” at noon today.

After about 30 minutes of anxious waiting, it righted itself and now applications are proceeding smoothly.

According to applicants, they said they were unable to select their respective state for the designated vaccination centres earlier.

This was probably due to a technical glitch preventing people from submitting their full applications.

Social media was rife with shared complaints of frustrated efforts to get the vaccine which is on a parallel track but not part of the main national vaccination programme.

In a later tweet, the Special Committee for Ensuring Access to Covid-19 Vaccine Supply (JKJAV) apologised for the inconvenience and said the technical hiccup experienced earlier has been resolved.

“The AstraZeneca appointment booking website is now back up and running. Please try again. Apologies for the inconvenience,” the tweet reads.

 

 

National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme coordinating minister Khairy Jamaluddin previously announced that the government will open the second round of AstraZeneca vaccine for registration for those above the age of 60 starting today.

The registration will also extend outside of the Klang Valley to Penang, Sarawak and Johor due to high Covid-19 cases within these states.

Under the second round of the opt-in vaccination programme, a total of 1,240,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine is offered, with those above the age of 60 being prioritised.

However, if there are excess vaccine slots that have not been taken up, then the AstraZeneca vaccines will become available to the general public for registration after May 26.

The vaccine injections would be given between June 7 and July 27 for the first dose at eight AstraZeneca Vaccine Administration Centres (PPVAZ).

The PPVAZ involved include those at the Setia SPICE Convention Centre, Penang; Persada Johor International Convention Centre, Johor Bahru; Borneo Convention Centre Kuching, Sarawak and Institut Kemahiran Belia Negara Miri, Sarawak.

The others are at the World Trade Centre Kuala Lumpur; Universiti Malaya, Kuala Lumpur; Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Selangor and Ideal Convention Centre, Shah Alam, Selangor.

Those who had registered their name under the waiting list during the booking of slots on May 2 will also be automatically included in this round of the AstraZeneca vaccination exercise. 

The divergent AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine programme was announced by the government in April after concerns emerged that the European-made vaccine can cause dangerous side effects.

The AstraZeneca vaccines are available via separate appointments only, as opposed to the national immunisation programme — which currently does not allow registrants to choose between the Pfizer-BioNTech and Sinovac vaccines used in the programme.