UK, Others Raise Funds to Distribute COVID-19 Vaccine to Nigeria, Others

By Ahmed Rahma

Funds are already being raised to pay for one billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines to be distributed to Nigeria and 91 other developing countries in 2021.

So far, the United Kingdom, which colonised Nigeria, has joined others like Canada, Japan and Germany to raise over $1 billion for this gesture.

Nigeria recently announced that it was expecting the vaccines soon and it is believed that 100,000 doses should be shipped into the country by the second quarter of the year.

The doses would be given to the nation of about 200 million people through the COVAX Advance Market Commitment (AMC).

“We’ll only be safe from this virus, when we’re all safe — which is why we’re focused on a global solution to a global problem,” Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said in a statement.

The United Kingdom is making efforts to tackle the virus. Its Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has so far approved three vaccines; the one made by US company Pfizer in conjunction with German’s BioNTech; another developed by Oxford University in partnership with AstraZeneca; and Moderna, produced by an American firm.

For the last vaccine, the UK government has made orders for 17 million doses expected in April. In total, the country has made orders to doses more than its entire population. The vaccines would be administered two times, with the second coming about two weeks after the first.

For Nigeria, which said it was expecting 100,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine through the World Health Organisation (WHO) soon, it would inoculate 40 per cent of the population this year and another 30 per cent net year.

To demonstrate the efficacy of the jabs, President Muhammadu Buhari, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and the 36 State Governors would be vaccinated on live television.

The Executive Director of the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA), Mr Faisal Shuaib, confirmed this last Thursday at the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19 briefing in Abuja, said the President.

The next day, Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), Mr Kayode Fayemi, reaffirmed this when he spoke with newsmen in Abuja

“We too will like to demonstrate to our citizens that we believe that vaccines will work.

“The Governors’ Forum managed the polio vaccines administration in the country and we have garnered a lot of experience.

“We have worked with the Primary Healthcare Development Agency and the Federal Ministry of Health.”