“The adult immigrants on the island have also been vaccinated, thus recording 100.5% of immunised adults,” he told Bernama.

Rithuan, who is also Labuan Covid-19 immunisation task force (CITF) chairman, said the task force had listed 68,500 adults as eligible for the immunisation programme.

“The number of eligible adults being given the vaccine has surpassed the target due to the Labuan CITF policy of inoculating people regardless of their nationality. We also offered the vaccine to the workers (from outside Labuan) in the Labuan shipping and oil and gas sectors,” he said.

Rithuan said thousands of Filipino refugees in the two refugee community settlement schemes have also been vaccinated as part of the committee’s efforts to mitigate the spread of the Covid-19 infection in the local community.

“We can see that the number of adults completing the vaccination will increase steadily as the number of people who received the first dose reached 102.94% as of yesterday (Sept 7).

“The more people vaccinated, the better we will be able to contain the spread of Covid-19 as our policy is to encourage shipping crew and those in the oil and gas sectors to get the shot. The number of people completing the (required) vaccine (doses) will certainly surpass our target,” he said.

Rithuan said Labuan CITF was also prepared to conduct the vaccination exercise for adolescents aged 16 and 17 years.

Labuan completed vaccinating 80% of its adult population on July 27 and became the first among the federal territories and states in the country to achieve herd immunity against Covid-19.

The Labuan-level national Covid-19 immunisation programme was launched on Feb 27. The territory reported seven cases of Covid-19 today.