Secretary to the Government of the Federation and Chairman of thePresidential Task Force on COVID-19, Boss Mustapha, has said about four millionvaccines from the COVAX facility for the COVID-19 vaccines are expected to
arrive in Nigeria on Monday.Addressing journalists on Saturday, Mustapha noted that the vaccineswould be in the country by March 1, 2021, but arrive at the Federal CapitalTerritory, Abuja, on March 2, according to the information provided by theUnited Nations Children’s Fund.
He said, “Well, I can assure you that the vaccines are coming and theyare coming very quickly. Barring any change in the delivery plan, as has beenrevealed to us by UNICEF, because the logistic is in the hands of UNICEF, webelieve that our vaccines will be back in here on March 1, 2021, by 10:30 pmand arrive in Abuja on March 2, 2021, at about 11:10 am.
“We are making preparations for it. But the truth about it is that as wereceive the vaccines, this one is coming from the COVAX facility, about four milliondoses of vaccines, we are supposed to have about 16 million in the firstquarter from the COVAX facility, expecting that by the time they supply all therange, we are expecting that they will supply 84 million doses from the COVAXfacility which is free of charge and will cover about 20 per cent of theNigerian population.
“We also have another source of vaccines coming in from the AVADfacility, which is the African Vaccine Action Team. We are expecting about 41million of that, a combination of AstraZeneca and Johnson and Johnson.
“Everything we are expecting from the COVAX facility is going to be theAstraZeneca which has a good ravage in terms of storage for us because it uses+2 – +8 per cent of refrigeration. It doesn’t come with any complication; wealready have that core chain available in all the local governments,constituencies and wards in this country.”
He expressed optimism that the country would receive the vaccinesalongside non-pharmaceutical measures as scheduled.
He added: “I believe we are well prepared to receive our vaccines and Ihope that they keep to this time frame that they have given us. We are eagerlyexpecting the vaccines, but I must caution Nigerians that it is going to be acombination of vaccines with non-pharmaceutical measures.
“Non-pharmaceutical measures will remain in place, wearing masks,keeping of social distancing, the need for personal hygiene and takingresponsibility to ensure that we do not congregate in large gatherings; avoidtravels that are not necessary.
“I wish us well. By the time we get our people vaccinated between 202140 per cent and 2021 30 per cent, a combination of a cumulative number of 70
per cent, we will be arriving at the point of herd immunity.”