PM: Everyone is a frontliner

PETALING JAYA: A “whole-of-society” approach will be implemented in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic, says Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin.

This approach will help prevent the spread of the virus while also ensuring that 80% of adult Malaysians are vaccinated against Covid-19 by February next year, he added.

“As of March 23, a total of 6.4 million Malaysians have registered to receive the vaccine through the MySejahtera app.

“On vaccine recipients, a total of 481,989 first and second doses have been administered so far, with Selangor recording the highest number of first dose recipients with a total of 58,552 doses, while Sarawak came in second highest with 10,166 doses, ” he said at the launch of the Community Empowerment Programme yesterday.

He noted that until the 80% vaccination target is fulfilled, the nation will continue to face difficulties in combating the spread of the virus.

“While the number of positive cases may have decreased, the number of infections remained high.

“Due to this worrying situation, the government has decided that the best measure or approach to combat the spread of infections in the community is by ensuring that the community itself increases its effort in playing the role as frontliners, ” he said.

He stressed that the efforts to curb the spread of Covid-19 will not be able to achieve its goal if it is not supported by everyone.

As such, he said that the Community Empowerment Programme would be used as a “weapon” to curb the spread of the virus.

Among the measures under the programme is to activate community-level committees.

Muhyiddin noted that community leaders are the backbone of their respective communities who must be collectively mobilised to ensure the success of the programme.

In this respect, he said the “whole-of-society” approach will be implemented under the Agent Basmi Covid-19 programme or ABC-19.

He said that ABC-19 will involve the participation of government agencies, community leaders and volunteers from NGOs nationwide.

“As of March 23, a total of 29,407 agency personnel and community leaders have reached out to over 1.32 million Malaysians through various programmes at more than 22,166 hotspots and focus areas, ” he said, adding that the membership under ABC-19 programme is set to increase following the involvement of volunteers.

Muhyiddin said that those under the ABC-19 programme would assist in promoting the Covid-19 vaccine registration while also educating others in the community on preventive Covid-19 measures.

He added the respective communities will also implement monitoring activities for Covid-19 cases while preventing outsiders from entering their respective areas without control.

“If we look at the Health Ministry’s statistics, infections within communities are still high, which is very worrying.

“We do not know who among them is infected because they do not have any symptoms, ” he added.

He also said that community leaders under the ABC-19 programme would ensure that their respective community abides by the Covid-19 standard operating procedures and the new normal.

Muhyiddin said the National Disaster Management Agency (Nadma) has been directed to oversea the implementation of the ABC-19 programme nationwide through their respective state and district secretariats.