Amina Dambatta off MTN hands over the J &J COVID-19 vaccine to an official of National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) |
The National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) has again appealed to Nigerians to get vaccinated against COVID-19.
The Executive Director, NPHCDA, Dr Faisal Shuaib, made the
call during the handover ceremony of over 604,800 doses of the Johnson &
Johnson (J&J) COVID-19 vaccines from telecom giant, MTN.
Shuaib, who was represented by the Director, of Disease
Control and Immunisation, NPHCDA, Dr Bassey Okposen, said MTN has been a
faithful partner in the country’s development.
The NPHCDA boss said in spite of vaccine availability, many
people are still hesitant to be vaccinated.
“We seem to be having the wrong information or impression
that COVID-19 is no longer existing or it is no longer a problem,” he said.
“The fact is that COVID-19 is still here with us in Nigeria
and elsewhere in the world, and it is a dangerous disease that can surge
anytime as it has mutating properties.”
He said the donation of 604,800 doses of vaccine means a
potential 604,800 fully vaccinated Nigerians.
“This is to say that MTN is wishing Nigeria the fast lane to
COVID-19 recovery,” he said.
He said Nigeria has successfully vaccinated 47,172,937
people representing 42.2 per cent of the eligible population, with the first
dose.
He said 34,242,083 people have been fully vaccinated,
representing 30.6 per cent of eligible persons.
He noted that 3,678,412 of the fully vaccinated people have
received their booster shot.
Shuaib appealed to all eligible Nigerians who are yet to be
vaccinated to avail themselves of current opportunities to receive their
COVID-19 vaccines.
“Over 47 million eligible persons in Nigeria have so far
received the vaccines. Although these people constitute less than half of the
overall population of eligible persons in the country, they cannot be wrong to
have taken the vaccine,” he said.
Shuaib said the agency has since rolled out its SCALES 3.0
strategy for the COVID-19 campaign which provides a unique opportunity for a
whole family to seek protection against vaccine-preventable diseases
concurrently in one package.
“This means that we are vaccinating eligible persons against
COVID-19 and other diseases such as hepatitis, yellow fever, polio, measles,
etc. concurrently,” he said.
He urges parents to take advantage of this opportunity to
get their eligible children vaccinated against vaccine-preventable childhood
diseases as earlier mentioned.
He said with the continued support of partners and
stakeholders at all levels, Nigeria will be able to attain herd immunity
against COVID-19 and step up recovery in the coming months.
General Manager of Regional Operation MTN, Ms Amina Dambata
said the vaccines were donated based on the agreement reached with African
Union to distribute vaccines to the African region.
Dambata said the J&J vaccines would get to those in
hard-to-reach areas within the country.
“I’m pleased on behalf of MTN to donate these vaccines
today,” she said.
J&J is among the three authorised vaccines in Nigeria
used to prevent COVID-19.
The others are the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.
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