Coronavirus: NPHCDA vaccinates 638,291 Nigerians

The National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) says 638, 291 people have received their first dose of the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines, as at March 30, 2021.

The NPHCDA made the disclosure on its official Twitter handle on Tuesday. “As of Tuesday evening, 638,291 eligible Nigerians have been vaccinated in 35 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

“Only Kogi is yet to commence COVID-19 vaccination.

“Kogi was not supplied with the COVID-19 vaccines because their Cold Store is still under repairs following vandalisation during the EndSARS protest

“But the agency in a tweet on Monday said that Mr Shuaib met with Kogi State Governor, Yahaya Bello, to resolve issues around vaccine storage and provision of security at the cold store,” the tweet said.

The NPHCDA also said that the proportion of vaccinated people in the country stood at 31.7 per cent as of March 30, 2021.

According to it, Lagos State had vaccinated 122, 714 people, making it the highest in the country.

“Ogun had vaccinated 50,052 people, closely followed by Kaduna with 43,601, Katsina- 36,075, Bauchi- 33,157 and Kwara- 28,681.’’

The NPHCDA said that the states with the lowest number of vaccinated people were Abia with 225 and Taraba with 878 persons.

It noted that the country hopes to vaccinate 109 million people against the COVID-19 virus over a period of two years.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that COVID-19 vaccination started in Nigeria on March 5, 2021, with healthcare workers who are mostly at risk to the infections being the first responders.

The agency had said that the vaccine roll-out would be in four phases, starting with health workers, frontline workers, COVID-19 rapid response team, laboratory network, policemen, petrol station workers and strategic leaders.

“Phase two – Older adults aged 50 years and above. Those with co-morbidities aged 18 – 49 years of age

“Phase three – Those in states and LGAs with high disease burden and who missed phases one and two.

“Phase four – Other eligible population as vaccines become available,” it said.

Nigeria received 3.94 million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines in March.

The country recently received another 300,000 doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines from telecom giant, MTN, as part of the latter’s contribution to Africa.

The country is also expected to receive more doses of vaccines over the next few months.