KUALA LUMPUR: The Health Ministry is currently exploring the use of other drugs in a bid to expand its treatment options for Covid-19 Categories 4 and 5 patients, apart from using Baricitinib.
Its deputy director-general (research and technical support) Datuk Dr Hishamshah Mohd Ibrahim said the country at present does not have many treatment options for Covid-19 patients in advanced stages.
However, he said Malaysia was continuously active in many clinical trials in the World Health Organisation's Covid-19 Solidarity Trial For Covid-19 Treatments.
"We are also now using Baricitinib, a new drug, and we are looking into some other drugs, which will probably receive EUA (Emergency Use Authorisation) approval soon.
"We are discussing with the manufacturers even before they are registered in their country of origin, just like vaccines.
"This is so that we have access to them as soon as they are made available under the EUA in the country of origin.
"We are looking into that because at the moment, the armamentarium of drugs that we can use to handle patients in severe Covid-19 categories are limited.
"So that remains a challenge to us as well," he said today.
Dr Hishamshah was speaking during a dialogue at the virtual National Recovery Summit dialogue titled "Working Together To Achieve the National Recovery Plan."
The summit was organised by KSI Strategic Institute for Asia Pacific and The Economic Club of Kuala Lumpur with the support of the National Recovery Council.
On a separate note, Dr Hishamshah said the ministry was disheartened by the nation's Covid-19 situation, where the number of daily infections as well as deaths have failed to decline since last year.
Malaysia, he said, has been experiencing the third wave of Covid-19 since September last year following the Sabah state election.
"We have not seen our numbers come down. As of yesterday (Sept 8), the number of daily cases recorded was over 19,000 and the total confirmed cases was beyond 1.9 million.
"The death rate registered was more than 19,000, which is one per cent of the total number of cases and lower than the world average of 2.6 or 3 per cent.
"However, one per cent is quite high even for our standards and we are very sad about this," he said, adding that the government consequently took efforts to mitigate the situation by enforcing the Movement Control Order.
Dr Hishamshah said one of the nation's key successful agendas in response to the Covid-19 pandemic was to provide vaccinations to the population who can be immunised.
Until recently, up to 70 to 80 per cent of the adult population in the country have received one dose of the vaccine, he said.
"We are targeting that by October, we need to immunise as many as 100 per cent of our total adult population. We are trying to achieve that.
"During the Merdeka Day period, all our states have achieved about 40 per cent of the immunisation rate.
"But now, we are ramping it up to 60 to 70 per cent and by October, we hope to achieve 100 per cent of immunisation of the adult population," he said.
