The Federal Government, on Wednesday, denied the claims that the AstraZeneca/Oxford COVID-19 vaccines received in the country yesterday (Tuesday) have been apportioned to “rich people”.
Executive Director, National Primary Health Care Development Agency, Dr Faisal Shuaib, during his appearance on Sunrise Daily a program Channels Television said the vaccine will be given based on prioritization starting with the frontline health workers who have been taking care of COVID-19 patients.
Recall that Nigeria had received about four million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, shipped via the COVAX Facility, a partnership between CEPI, Gavi, UNICEF and WHO on Tuesday afternoon in Abuja.
Shuaib said, “I will tell you categorically that we have not allotted these vaccines to the rich people or to the people in the urban areas, absolutely not. Mr President has been very clear.
“Mr Vice President has also added his voice and the Chairman of the Presidential Task Force has communicated this at the Presidential Task Force media briefings. He has made it very clear in terms of who we are going to prioritise and I will repeat it here again that the first set of people who are going to be taking these vaccines are those people who have sacrificed in the last one year taking care of all Nigerians that have come down with Covid-19. So, the frontline health workers.
“On Friday, we are going to be launching the vaccines, we are going to be rolling them out at the treatment centres at the national hospital. Our priority will be the health workers that are frontline. We are going to be giving these vaccines to first responders.
“We are also going to be looking at people outside of the health sector who are at risk of getting Covid-19. We are going to be looking at those strategic leaders like Mr President and the Vice-President, those people who will also want to take the vaccines publicly so that they can motivate the followers to take the vaccines, to convince them that the vaccines are very safe.”