KUALA LUMPUR, March 15 (Xinhua) -- Malaysia will begin administering the COVID-19 vaccines made by the Chinese biopharmaceutical company Sinovac Biotech, the coordinating minister for the national COVID-19 immunization program said Monday.

Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said Sinovac's CoronaVac vaccines would be rolled out starting Thursday, and that he himself would be the first to receive the jab in Negeri Sembilan state, he told a press briefing.

"We will begin vaccination using the Sinovac vaccine at the Rembau Hospital. I will be the first to receive Sinovac," he said.

Malaysia is receiving a batch of finished Sinovac vaccine doses from China on Monday with another batch expected on March 22.

The Sinovac vaccines have received conditional approval by the country's drug regulator, the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA).

Earlier, Malaysia took delivery of its first batch of the Sinovac vaccine on Feb. 27. The vaccines would go through a fill and finish process by Malaysia's leading pharmaceutical company Pharmaniaga, which signed a partnership with Sinovac in January.

Separately, the health ministry reported 1,208 new COVID-19 infections on Monday, bringing the national total to 324,971.

Health Ministry Director-General Noor Hisham Abdullah said in a press statement that nine of the new cases are imported and 1,199 are local transmissions.

Another three deaths were reported, pushing the death toll to 1,213.

Some 1,973 patients were released after recovery, bringing the total cured and discharged to 308,247 or 94.9 percent of all cases.

Of the remaining 15,511 active cases, 155 are being held in intensive care units and 70 of those are in need of assisted breathing.