The federal government has disclosed that COVID-19 vaccines won’t arrive soon enough in Nigeria.
The Minister of State for Health, Olorunnimbe Mamora, said this while urging Nigerians to not be complacent in containing the COVID-19 pandemic on Thursday at the joint national briefing of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19.
Mamora, who was represented by the Director, Hospital Services, Federal Ministry of Health, Dr Adebimpe Adebiyi, assured Nigerians of FG’s determination to scale back the spread of COVID-19 within the country.
The minister said, “We are working very hard to get vaccines for our people. it may not come in time , therefore we’d like to be alive to get the vaccines once they come.
“We got to be alive to get the vaccines once they come. I even have brought this up to underscore the importance of compliance with non-pharmaceutical measures as advised to scale back transmission.”
The minister added that as of Wednesday, new cases recorded were 1,354 with one death; while the entire number of cases tested was 1,004,915.
“Number of confirmed cases is 94,369. Active cases stand at 15,764. Discharged cases till date are 77,299. Number of deaths till date is 1,324 with case deathrate of 1.4 per cent.
“The federal is decided to make sure morbidity thanks to COVID-19 is reduced to the barest minimum while improving on the deathrate ,” Mamora said.
He said that appropriate measures were being taken to realize these objectives.
According to him, a second phase assessment of the isolation and treatment centres country-wide to verify challenges was to be administered immediately.
This, he said, would enable the govt to supply appropriate intervention measures required to strengthen these centres.
“We will still appeal to states to extend testing and get in touch with tracing. The cooperation of the states with the federal authorities is critical to our collective objective of defeating COVID-19,” he added.
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