KUALA LUMPUR, March 10 – Vijayarani Govindan has disputed the Ministry of Health’s (MOH) conclusion that her son, Revnesh Kumar, did not die from Covid-19 vaccination, Klang MP Charles Santiago said.
Although MOH’s preliminary post-mortem report eliminated the coronavirus vaccine as a cause of death, it did not state what had killed the teenager who suddenly died last January at age 13 years 18 days after receiving his first Covid-19 vaccine dose.
Charles — who met Vijayarani yesterday with National Human Rights Society (Hakam) president and lawyer Gurdial Singh Nijar — said that Vijayarani’s request for an independent inquiry into her son’s death should be treated fairly.
“Vijayarani is asking for an independent assessment of the autopsy report, which I think is a fair and just request.” Charles told CodeBlue today.
When asked if Vijayarani would sue the government for his son’s death, Charles said: “No discussion at this time on suing the government.”
Charles said the priority now would be the review of the preliminary autopsy report produced by MOH.
Revnesh’s parents received a peer-reviewed preliminary report from MOH yesterday that stated the Covid-19 vaccine was not the cause of her son’s death, based on a consensus opinion of government forensic experts, without stating what had killed the boy.
“According to Vijayarani, the doctors tried to convince her to accept the findings and conclusion after going through the report with her,” Charles said.
“During our conversation, she said she remains unconvinced as the post-mortem report failed to indicate the cause of her son’s death. Revnesh, a healthy kid, died 18 days after receiving the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine’s first dose.
“Vijayarani is convinced the report needs to be challenged and calls for an independent body to review KKM’s preliminary autopsy report due to what she describes as ‘discrepancies’ in the doctors’ explanation.”
Charles, who agreed with Vijayarani’s call for an independent review on the preliminary report, said that this measure would seek an answer for the plight of Revnesh’s parents and assure other parents in the country to vaccinate their children against Covid-19 safely.
The DAP lawmaker also called on the government to reveal the number of deaths among children and children with illnesses that were caused by Covid-19 vaccines.
“MOH has to inform the public the number of deaths involving children and other ailments children face after the vaccine. Keeping quiet and saying all is good creates anxiety and panic and fear among parents,” he said.
According to the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency’s (NPRA) weekly report on Covid-19 vaccine adverse events following immunisation (AEFI) released to the press yesterday, 141 AEFI reports among children aged five to 11 have been received as of March 4.
The vast majority are mild side effects, while four are of serious adverse effects. NPRA previously reported that two serious AEFI in the paediatric Covid-19 vaccination programme (PICKids) were exacerbated asthma and Bell’s palsy in a 10-year-old girl and 10-year-old boy respectively. Both have recovered.
NPRA’s report did not specify what were the other two serious AEFI cases reported in PICKids.
According to Free Malaysia Today, Revnesh’s autopsy report would be completed in a week’s time and it would take time to produce a full medical report.
Revnesh, who received a first dose of Pfizer-BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine on December 30, died on January 16 after a sudden collapse.
Previously, Vijayarani questioned the need for further analysis to be done overseas, saying that local medical tech should be able to identify the cause of her son’s sudden death at age 13. Vijayarani and her husband, Naresh Kumar, live in Putrajaya together with their daughter.
MOH had announced plans to conduct additional tests on internal tissue samples that MOH said may need to be sent abroad for further analysis to get an “accurate result”.
