KUALA LUMPUR, April 14 – Malaysians vaccinated with Sinovac or Sinopharm can apply to the Ministry of Health (MOH) for a second booster to fulfil travel requirements of countries that do not recognise the Covid-19 vaccines.
Despite the European Union’s (EU) recognition of Malaysia’s Covid-19 vaccination certificate, Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin noted that 10 EU countries currently do not recognise Sinovac, while 11 do not recognise Sinopharm.
The EU permits entry to international visitors who are fully inoculated with vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA): Pfizer-BioNTech, Novavax, Moderna, AstraZeneca-Oxford, and Johnson & Johnson.
Individual EU countries are free to determine whether or not to permit entry to international travellers vaccinated with other coronavirus vaccines.
“The Ministry of Health allows applications from individuals who want to go overseas to get a second booster dose to fulfil travel requirements, for example, some countries in the EU who don’t recognise Sinovac or Sinopharm as a primer dose or also as a booster,” Khairy told a press conference today.
“Individuals who want to go to those countries can get a second booster after at least one month from the first booster to fulfil travel requirements.”
The 10 EU countries that do not currently recognise Sinovac or Sinopharm are Bulgaria, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, and Romania.
Poland recognises Sinovac, but not Sinopharm.
“Recognition of our vaccination certificate by the EU means that they accepted the MySejahtera digital Covid-19 certificate as equivalent to the EU Digital COVID Certificate,” Khairy said.
“This is reciprocal where Malaysia will also accept the EUDCC as equivalent to the MySejahtera digital Covid-19 certificate. This means that holders of certificates issued by these two countries will be able to use them under the same conditions as holders of an EU Digital COVID Certificate. However, pertaining to the specific type of vaccines, travellers still need to follow the requirements of the respective countries.”
