Dr Tan Maw Pin of Universiti Malaya said the government does not specify in its vaccination plans who frontliners are.
“Care home workers are frontliners,” she said. “In fact, those working in care homes should be prioritised over the usual frontliners. This is because Covid-19 spreads like wildfire if it gets introduced into a care home. Older people have a weaker immune system.”
Tan said vaccinating people in care homes was also crucial as it was more difficult for the elderly to follow the health and safety standard operating procedures such as closing the mouth and nose when sneezing or coughing.
She said implementing physical distancing was also a challenge in many care homes as most were crowded.
“There is usually no 1m distance between the beds since care home owners need to keep their costs down so families can afford to send their elderly there.”
Commenting on reports of deaths among the elderly who got vaccinated in countries that had started distributing the vaccines, Tan said there was no direct link between the deaths and the vaccine.
“The truth is people die. That’s a fact of life. The question to ask is: would these people have died even if they didn’t get the vaccine? The answer is: probably.”
She also referred to the Covid-19 death toll of people older than 70 years. “The mortality rate for Covid-19 among those over the age of 70 is one in four or one in three. But when you’re talking about having the vaccine, the risk of death from what we gathered so far is 0%.”
However, she said caregivers should expect vaccination of the elderly to produce side effects such as fevers, body aches, headaches and swelling at the injection site.
She also said many care home residents were still confused about the pandemic and the movement restrictions.
Currently, care home residents are not allowed to eat in communal settings.
“Many of the elderly residents do not understand the huge change in their daily routines,” Tan said. “Moreover, their family members are not allowed to visit.”
As a result, she said, they risked greater memory loss and becoming more depressed.
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