Debated in Parliament on 13 Sep 2021.
Mr Xie Yao Quan asked the Minister for Health whether the Ministry will allow persons who have been fully vaccinated with an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine under the national vaccination programme to be additionally inoculated with Sinovac in order to facilitate essential travel to certain countries while guidelines for booster shots remain under development.
From a public health point of view, persons who have received two doses of an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine authorised under the Pandemic Special Access Route (PSAR) are considered fully vaccinated, and do not require any further vaccine doses at this time.
The safety of receiving two complete regimens of two different vaccines is not established. If an individual wishes to take additional vaccines in order to travel to certain countries, then the consideration at this point is one of allocation and fairness. There are individuals who are unvaccinated for various reasons and are waiting for additional stocks of the vaccines from Sinovac to arrive, so that they can get vaccinated. MOH’s view is that this group should be prioritised above those who want additional vaccinations in order to travel.
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