President Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria has said the country is trying its very best to develop its own Covid-19 Vaccines to fight the growing cases of the dreaded disease.
He said this in an interview on Thursday “We are working very hard with the ministry of health to develop vaccines. And we shouldn’t make noise about it until we succeed”
Health experts in the country says Nigeria needs to triple its vaccination drive from just over 100,000 doses a day to meet its target of inoculating more than half its population by the end of the next year.
The giants of Africa has been researching on options to acquire or purchase vaccines through the COVAX facility to enable it to inoculate at least 70% of her population.
Nigeria destroyed over 1 million expired vaccines last month and some of the vaccines received were close to expiring.
The Nigerian Minister of state for Health, Dr. Olorunnimbe Mamora, said on CNN that “the country was working to establish a vaccine-manufacturing hub within two to three years.”
He further added that “this would solemnly depend on the stability of funds because Vaccine manufacturing is not done in a jiffy, .
He said ‘ yesterday (Thursday), we had engagements with some of our international developments partners towards establishing our vaccine manufacturing hub. Its a joint venture between the federal governments and an indigenous pharmaceutical company.
The Minister of Health officially added “ The timeline is a function of how soon we get funding. We have to source funds through international agencies as well as technological support. We are looking at the next two or three years,
Nigeria has recorded a total of 246,195 cases and 3,066 death since the pandemic came into her country on 28th February
The president said in the interview that his administration is encouraging Nigerians to get vaccinated. Fewer than 4% of adults in the country that has over 200 million people have fully been vaccinated.
The Minister of state for health says the fear of the vaccine is still an issue among Nigerians, “We are hoping to double or triple our vaccination rate. We want to be able to vaccinate more than 70% of our population. But we are still dealing with vaccine hesitancy” he further added “ We have a large stock of vaccine now”