‘Tell parents why it is important to vaccinate’

Reports by RAZAK AHMAD, VENESA DEVI, ZAKIAH KOYA, IVAN LOH, HANIS ZAINAL and LOH FOON FONG 

PETALING JAYA: Many parents have voiced their support for the Health Minister’s announcement to make vaccination compulsory, describing this as a public health measure.

Supporting the proposal, Sheikh Abdul Rahman Zainal Abidin said he wanted to ensure the well-being of his own five-year-old child as well as other children.

However, he said there was a need for a study on the ease of access to vaccination for all Malaysians before these could be made mandatory.

The ministry, he said, also needed to increase its efforts to educate Malaysians on vaccinations at the same time.

Lending her voice is Tun Dr Siti Hasmah Mohamad Ali who urged medical practitioners and nurses to give parents the best advice on the importance of vaccination for their children.

The Prime Minister’s wife said she was aware of anti-vaccine parents who refused to allow their children to be vaccinated due to various factors and beliefs.

“There are parents who do not think that there is a need for vaccine because their children will grow up and develop natural immunity but parents cannot wait until their children develop natural immunity.

“We do not want to see something happen to our children because they are not being vaccinated (for example) like paralysis and so on,” she told staff and nurses at the Ayer Hangat Health Clinic in Langkawi yesterday.

She was responding to a question from a nurse on tips to advise parents who rejected vaccinations for their children, especially newborn babies.

Dr Siti Hasmah said most parents who chose to reject vaccinations for their children did so based on inaccurate information.

“There are claims that the vaccines are ‘haram’ (forbidden) and there are possible side effects.

“When a child develops fever after immunisation, that is not the side effect because the vaccine is to prevent more harmful diseases.”