Malaysia announces RM$200m to fight COVID-19
- Claire Lee
- Topics: Compensation and Benefits, Home Page - News, Malaysia, News
Malaysia has allocated an additional RM200 million (US$48.3 million) in its fight against COVID-19, which the Ministry of Health (MOH) will use in its treatment of COVID-19 patients.
“The Ministry of Finance (MOF) will give priority to public health needs and ensure sufficient resources in the effort to tackle the rise in COVID-19 cases,” said Finance Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Zafrul Abdul Aziz.
“Despite the new allocation, the MOF will continue to monitor the situation and engage with the MOH and other relevant ministries on whether or not they would need extra resources,” he said.
The new allocation brings the total COVID-19 allocation to MOH this year to RM1 billion (US$0.24 billion).
The government has since pumped a total of RM65 billion (US$15.7 billion) into a COVID-19 response fund, with almost RM40 billion (US$9.66 billion) spent in 2020. Most of the funds were allocated to save jobs and subsidise daily expenses for its citizens.
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Although the government had allocated RM4 billion (US$0.97 billion) for the subsidies in 2020, only RM1.2 billion (US$0.29 billion) has been spent up until April 2021.
“These programmes will continue for as long as needed but we’ll have to continue monitoring the crisis,” added the minister.
