KUCHING, July 2: The Ministry of Transport Sarawak (MOT) had submitted a total of 12,162 names of individuals working in the transport sector to the respective Divisional Health Offices or Resident Offices.
Its Minister Datuk Lee Kim Shin said the submission signifies the Ministry’s intention to have vaccination priority be given to these individuals who are providing service under essential services in the transport sector.
“Of the namelist submitted, 4,677 are e-hailing drivers, 1,576 are from forwarding agencies including lorry drivers, 1,718 aviation staff, 1,147 taxi drivers, 982 food delivery riders, 800 driving school instructors, 645 bus drivers and 617 riverine transport operators.
“The MOT has been working closely with the Divisional Health Offices or Resident Offices to ensure that the transport frontliners are vaccinated. It is important that these workers get vaccinated as they interact with the members of the public daily,” he said in a statement today.
He also mentioned that such effort is in accordance with that of the State government to accelerate the Covid-19 vaccination in order to attain herd immunity target by August 2021.
Lee added that based on the feedback of lorry drivers, 1,397 lorry drivers have been vaccinated so far and that is 89 per cent of the lorry drivers’ namelist submitted by Sarawak Forwarding Agency Association.
“This included 101 lorry drivers out of 151 lorry drivers from Miri who are involved with transporting goods to Brunei and also to Limbang and Lawas passing through Brunei.
“Recently, Brunei authority requires all foreign registered transporters including those from Sarawak to be vaccinated before they are allowed to enter or passing through Brunei to deliver essential goods and services effective July 13, 2021,” he pointed out.
To date, many of the public transport frontliners who have not been vaccinated have already have been contacted by the respective Divisional Health Offices or Resident Offices on their appointment dates.
Lee, who is the Senadin assemblyman, disclosed that some of the food delivery riders have received their first dose of vaccines at the National Youth Skills Institute (IKBN) vaccination centre (PPV) in Miri today.
“Currently, there are 169 food delivery riders in Miri Division whose names have been submitted for vaccination. In this respect, I urge those other frontliners who have not register for vaccination to cooperate and quickly contact the respective Divisional Resident Offices to get their names registered for vaccination as soon as possible,” he emphasised. — DayakDaily
