BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN — Starting from September 24, individuals can get their first COVID-19 vaccine dose at the Indoor Stadium vaccination centre every Friday without making an appointment.
The health ministry is expanding its walk-in vaccination services from 2.30pm to 8pm every Friday at the Indoor Stadium as it seeks to ramp up vaccinations to 10,000 doses a day.
Previously, walk-in vaccinations were only allowed for the elderly, special needs people and pregnant women.
Health Minister YB Dato Seri Setia Dr Hj Mohammad Isham Hj Jaafar said the walk-in vaccination on Friday will prioritise those who have yet to receive their first jab, or do not have a BruHIMS account and BruHealth app.
Anyone who does not have the BruHealth app or BruHIMS are advised to bring personal documents such as identity cards, passports or other official identification documents to the vaccination site.
Individuals whose first-dose appointments have been rescheduled to a later date can also get their jabs via the walk-in service, but are required to cancel their booking on BruHealth.
“We will try to vaccinate as many people as we can within the period, about 1,000 people,” YB Dato Dr Hj Mohd Isham said in his daily press briefing.
The health ministry restarted first-dose vaccinations last Thursday after receiving 100,000 doses of vaccine doses from China and Australia each. Japan has also pledged to donate a similar amount of vaccine doses to Brunei.
A vaccine shortage forced the ministry to suspend first-dose vaccinations for two weeks before other countries stepped forward with vaccine donations to help Brunei resume its inoculation drive.
On average, Brunei administered 6,128 vaccine doses a day over the past week.
As of Wednesday, 58 percent of the population has received at least one vaccine shot while 37.5 percent of residents are fully vaccinated.
111 new cases reported
The health ministry Thursday detected 111 new coronavirus cases, a 45 percent decline from a day earlier.
One new cluster of nine cases has been identified following a mass testing exercise around the Jalan Muara area on Wednesday night.
The number of active clusters stood at 100 after two clusters – Authority for Building Control and Construction Industry and 535 – were closed without new infections in the past 28 days.
A total of 125 people were discharged overnight, bringing the number of active cases to 1,765.
Thirty-eight people are in the intensive care unit, including eight who are critically ill.
The minister also confirmed that a child fell from a building at one of the government’s makeshift isolation facilities, but is in a stable condition.
He said the child did not suffer from serious head injuries and is under observation at Raja Isteri Pengiran Anak Hjh Saleha Hospital.
Responding to a question of a viral video showing a man causing a ruckus at an isolation centre, YB Dato Dr Hj Mohd Isham said the police are now handling the case.
“Apart from being violent, he also damaged government property, so this will be brought to court,” he said, adding that the incident took place two days ago.
The ministry had reported past incidents of poor behaviour among COVID-19 patients at isolation facilities, including harassing other patients, stealing government property and causing public disturbance.