The National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) has said some frontline health workers will on Friday March 5, receive the COVID-19 vaccine in the country before the President, Muhammadu Buhari and Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo.
Executive Director of NPHCDA, Faisal Shuaib, made this known at the second edition of State House weekly briefing.
The briefing focused on the arrival of the COVID-19 vaccine and Nigeria’s response to the pandemic, in the last one year.
According to the NPHCDA boss, Buhari and Osinbajo will receive the Oxford/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine on Saturday.
The Chairman of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 (PTF) and Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha will also receive his first dose of the vaccine on the same day.
At the event, the Director-General of National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, warned Nigerians on the existence of fake COVID-19 vaccines in the global market.
She said: “That’s why NAFDAC is focusing on track-and-trace, to ensure no infiltration of substandard vaccines in supply chain. Traceability is very important; we can trace the vaccines from airport to the patient.”
On his part, the Minister of Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire, described the arrival of the first batch of the COVID-19 vaccine as a game changer.
He, however, stated that “we must not stretch our luck. We must continue with our non-pharmaceutical measures.
“We must look at vaccine as a game changer, but make no mistake that it’s a replacement for everything else.
”It is an additional strategy. Vaccines are an addition to the existing response, not a replacement.”
