MOH : Vaccine will be out in market in ONE year to ONE and a half year time

The Health director-general, Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said that Covid-19 vaccine may be made available in the market in a year time.

Dr Noor Hisham said that the "Research is ongoing and hopefully we can get the vaccine as soon as possible," however, he predicted that "It will take probably about a year or a year and a half before we can get a vaccine in the market."

He added that the World Health Organisation (WHO) is still looking into researches and compounds to develop a vaccine for the virus.

While in Malaysia, the Health Ministry had accepted blood plasma donation from several Covid-19 recovered patients for research purposes.

"They are donating their blood to help MOH carry out research and for science to look at the viscosity of antibodies (which will be used to treat Covid-19 patients)," he said.

He added that the blood will first screened to make sure that it is free of other infections.

MOH will also conduct Covid-19 tests on blood donors to ensure they are really free of the virus.

"After that, MOH will take blood from them and separate it into red blood cells and plasma. The plasma will later be sent to IMR (Institute for Medical Research) to study its antibody viscosity."

"The procedure will be repeated after two weeks. If the antibody viscosity is high, then MOH may use the plasma from the patient to treat other patients," he said.

News source from The Star

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