Faisal Shuaib: NPHCDA was working with NAFDAC to set a date for the destruction of vaccines
Nigeria will destroy around one million Covid-19 vaccines. Faisal Shuaib, head of National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA), said on Monday
He added that his agency was working with the drug regulator NAFDAC to set a date for their destruction.
Nigeria’s Health minister Osagie Ehanire said last week that some Covid-19 vaccines doses was donated by rich western countries had a remaining shelf life of only weeks, adding to the country’s challenges in vaccinating its people. Fewer than 4 per cent of adults in Africa’s most populous nation of over 200 million have been fully vaccinated.
Two sources confirmed to Reuters that up to one million Covid-19 vaccines have expired in Nigeria last month without being used, which is one of the biggest single losses of doses.
On this issue, Shuaib said that the country had been accepting vaccines with short shelf lives from international donor nations in an attempt to use them quickly and provide some level of protection for Nigerians due to vaccine scarcity in the past.
Nigeria will no longer accept vaccines with a short shelf life, citing presidential committee decision, he added Vaccination in Nigeria began on 5 March 2021. As of December, more than 600,000 people have received their first dose and more than 300,000 people have received their second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine.
On 2 March, the first shipment of four million Oxford AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine doses from the COVAX initiative arrived in Nigeria. Cyprian Ngong, a doctor, was the first person to receive the Covid-19 dose in the nation.
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