SPEECH BY MR ONG YE KUNG, MINISTER FOR HEALTH AND COORDINATING MINISTER FOR SOCIAL POLICIES, AT THE 17TH ASEAN HEALTH MINISTERS MEETING IN KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA, 10 SEPTEMBER 2026

Chair, Excellencies

Ladies and gentlemen

1.         Selamat pagi. I congratulate Malaysia for your leadership in developing the ASEAN Strategic Health Agenda (ASHA) 2026-2030. I think it is a very important live document that will guide our work for many years to come.

2.         In particular, at yesterday's retreat, I talked about how the document addresses what I see as the three pandemics that we have to deal with in the long term. What are these three pandemics? I think it is the non-communicable diseases (NCD) pandemic, the antimicrobial resistance (AMR) pandemic, and also the Disease X pandemic.

3.         Let me continue talking about these three pandemics, which I have talked about at the retreat yesterday. I will briefly talk about the first two, and maybe I will elaborate a bit more on the last one, the Disease X pandemic. First, the NCD pandemic is driven by the fact that life got better and quality of life improved throughout ASEAN. So, we are all facing an ageing population. And along with that, prevalence of NCDs is rising. There are some things that I think we can do as a region to help address the NCD pandemic, particularly on the preventive side. One is just simply labelling our food. Singapore has done so, so has Malaysia and Indonesia. From our experience, it works.

4.         The second is to recognise the immense risk factor of smoking as well as vapes. It simply drives up the prevalence of all NCDs. In particular, vapes is a relatively new product that is really harming the health of our people. Some countries in ASEAN, including Singapore, have banned vapes, but it still flows through our borders. And I think we are all at different stages of trying to restrict or ban vapes. If this is something we can do as a region, I think we will also improve the health of our people over the long term.

5.         The second pandemic is the AMR pandemic: antimicrobial resistance. It is often described as a silent pandemic, but the impact is anything but silent. It is mainly driven by bacteria evolving to become more resistant to antibiotics. I also suggest that in the coming years, ASEAN can do our part to fight AMR together. As a start, we can take steps to ensure that antibiotics remain a prescription drug, or curb the illegal dispensation of antibiotics, and hospitals can also adopt best practices in the administration of antibiotics to patients. Otherwise, I fear there will come a day where our people will be afraid of going to the hospitals because that is where they can get infected and are unable to be cured.

6.         And finally, the Disease X crisis: the Disease X pandemic. Almost five years have passed since COVID-19, but the next pandemic crisis is an evolutionary certainty, and we need to get ourselves prepared. An effective vaccine remains the key to overcoming the Disease X pandemic crisis. Many countries and regions have realised this and also understand that there was an unequal distribution of vaccines during the COVID-19 pandemic, and therefore they are determined to develop and produce their own vaccines the next time, and be self-sufficient. But we all know this is not easy, because it requires significant know-how. And even if you can set up a production facility, it has to be kept warm during peacetime.

7.         There are many efforts ongoing by the World Health Organization (WHO), Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance (Gavi), the Regionalised Vaccine Manufacturing Collaborative (RVMC) to strengthen the pandemic preparedness of the world and ensure security and self-reliance at the regional level. The RVMC, in particular, is acting as a planner, consultant, advisor, and broker for specific regions, and it has decided to focus its work on Africa, Latin America, and ASEAN.

8.         ASEAN has made significant progress post COVID-19 to strengthen our vaccine production ecosystem. I suggest we take stock of our individual national capabilities with the view to collectively support regional resilience. We can start by developing a shared view of what are our regional needs for vaccines, identify priority vaccine products, what are the technology platforms that we want to build, what is the required capacity for production of drug substances as well as drug products, and then develop a plan to scale up production and also strengthen our regulatory readiness. And this can in fact be a role that ASEAN Centre for Public Health Emergencies and Emerging Diseases (ACPHEED) can take up.

9.         Chair, the three pandemics represent the most critical health challenges for ASEAN and the world. They are also areas that require the most international cooperation. And if we succeed in addressing these issues, the impact in shaping our common health future will also be the greatest. Thank you.