JOHOR BARU, June 2 — Johor DAP’s Dr Boo Cheng Hau today claimed that the Perikatan Nasional (PN) government could have saved up to RM1.4 billion of taxpayer’s money if all vaccine procurements were made transparently, including Sinovac’s Coronavac that is supplied by domestic pharmaceutical corporation Pharmaniaga Berhad.

"After a preliminary research, I found out that the federal government would have saved between RM900 million to RM1.4 billion had it made all vaccine procurements transparent.

"The federal government had earlier announced a RM3.5 billion allocation in total for 55.3 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to inoculate 82 per cent of the population in order to achieve herd immunity.

"The average cost for each dose of Covid-19 vaccine spent by the government is RM55 (US$13.42), which is 30 per cent costlier than each dose procured by the United States government at RM42,” said Dr Boo in a statement today.

On May 24, the Covid-19 Immunisation Task Force (CITF) had debunked claims on social media that it overspent to procure vaccines for Malaysians.

It clarified that it has only spent RM3.5 billion to procure vaccines for 38.5 million people, which it insisted was reasonable even when compared to Singapore and the United States.

Dr Boo, who is Johor DAP’s state committee member, pointed out that the United States government spent US$12.4 billion in procuring 1.21 billion doses of Covid-19 vaccines.

"Why did the PN government spend 30 per cent more on each dose of vaccine procured?” he questioned.

The 57-year-old general medical practitioner said he had factored in the two-dose vaccines by multiplying the population by two doses.

Dr Boo said the Finance Ministry needs to make the vaccine procurement process transparent, and explain to the public the reasons that Malaysian taxpayers pay RM13 or 30 per cent more than their American counterparts for each dose of Covid-19 vaccine.

For the total amount of 55.3 million doses of vaccine procured, he said Malaysian taxpayers would have to bear an additional RM719 million as compared to the American average vaccine price per dose.

Dr Boo also listed down the varying international market prices for Sinovac’s Coronavac per dose — from the lowest of RM20.62 per dose, RM56, RM122 to the highest RM156 per dose.

Dr Boo explained that Pharmaniaga imports the vaccine’s raw material from Sinovac and it does only bottling and distribution of the vaccine to reduce the manufacturing cost, and hence save Malaysian taxpayers’ money.

"Profiteering should be the least consideration for any government-linked corporation (GLC) in times of the pandemic

"Nonetheless, it shows that this practice has increased the overall burden on the taxpayers, which tallies with the total cost of RM3.5 billion announced by the federal government for only 46 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines in total,” said Dr Boo.

He added that Pharmaniaga as a government-linked corporation (GLC) managed by the Finance Ministry, should clarify the questions surrounding the procurement of Covid-19 as to why there is a higher cost in Malaysia.

"The Finance Ministry has to make Pharmaniaga open about its cost and pricing,” said Dr Boo.

Last month, CITF had responded to claims that Malaysia’s vaccine procurement was inexplicably high.

It compared Malaysia’s spending to neighbouring Singapore, saying the island republic spent SG$1 billion on two-dose vaccines for its population of 5.7 million.

CITF also pointed out that the United States spent US$1.95 billion for 100 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech brand vaccine.

"Based on this info, Malaysia’s procurement seems fair and even more competitive than other countries,” CITF said.