70 per cent 2022 vaccination target: ‘Walking the talk’ with strategic implementation
Issues regarding COVID-19 pandemic has assumed new narratives with recent development demanding the need for new directives and response structures. The progressive mutations of the Virus to more transmissible and deadly variants have informed changes in guidelines across the world. The discovery of the Omicron variant in Nigeria, has in the past few days brought before the Country the need to fasten her belt. This has become more resounding particularly as the roves of festivities, are much in view, considered as a factor with possibilities of sparking wide spread reach of the virus. The relaxation of the enforcement safety protocols is known to have taken course over the past six months, since the arrival of the vaccine was believed to be an antidote against complications that may inform huge losses. Hence, while some respites have begun to take course with the arrival of the vaccine, it has been lamented within the period of arrival and the present, the slow pace of vaccination profile in in Nigeria which has seen only about three percentage of the Country’s population vaccinated.
Just as the need for vaccination remains important, several subjects such as popular hostilities against the vaccines, and very strongly, difficulties in accessibility and availability of the vaccines are much in view. The question of getting larger part of the population vaccinated has been marked with bottlenecks which do not present very deliberate scheme to achieve the desideratum. The Federal Government had again on Monday boasted of having enough COVID-19 vaccines to cover over 70 percent of Nigeria’s population by December 2022. The Chairman, Presidential Steering Committee PSC on COVID-19 and Secretary to the Government of the Federation SGF, Mr Boss Mustapha, at the opening of a two-day national summit on the pandemic in Abuja said Nigeria is now in the era of Vaccines and Non-Pharmaceutical Intervention (NPI) measures.
“We need to encourage all eligible persons to get vaccinated and keep observing the washing of hands, wearing of face masks, keep physical distance and avoid crowded areas. Nigeria has invested in enough vaccines that can cover over 70% of our population before the end of 2022. These vaccines are safe and efficacious, hence it is better and safer to be vaccinated against this virus, now,” he was quoted.
It was gathered the National COVID-19 Summit was convened to bring all stakeholders together to discuss the theme, “Pushing Through the Last Mile to End the Pandemic and Build Back Better,” to identify successes, gaps and lessons learnt so far in Nigeria’s National Response to COVID-19 from March 2020 till date “in the bid to develop strategies to actualise the international commitments towards ending COVID-19 before the end of Year 2022.”
The objectives set for the Summit include to come up with a review of the Country’s COVID-19 response from February 2020 to November 2021 – to identify successes, gaps, and lessons to be learnt; Identify resources and develop strategies that will actualise the Country’s expressed international commitments towards ending COVID-19 by 31st December 2022; Develop an Accountability Framework for COVID-19 response and health security in Nigeria.
Also were synthesise the blueprint for Nigeria’s pandemic recovery, reconstruction, health security, and sustainability; and to articulate actionable recommendations to President Muhammadu Buhari on the governance structure, resources, and policies needed to end COVID-19 in Nigeria by 31st December 2022, and build back the health system and the economy to better respond to future health-security threats.
Present global realities have prompted the international community to corroborate the insinuation that the pandemic will persist for few more years, informing world leaders recently to come to the conclusion that if efforts are not renewed and aggressive measures are not taken, COVID-19 pandemic will continue to ravage humanity well longer than earlier envisaged. The realities have thus informed Countries in the developed world to set the end of 2022 as the timeline to end the COVID-19 pandemic.
While the Federal Government has boasted a goal of 70 percent vaccination of Nigeria’s population by 2022, it is inarguable that such target would only be realised if implementation strategies are coordinated to foster parameters towards the agenda. The subsisting measures and approaches employed reveal nothing but a slow pace of vaccination process shrouded with bottlenecks. It is noteworthy that beyond the subjects of administrative bottlenecks and subjects of accessibility to vaccines, the recalcitrant subject of popular hostilities and rejection of the vaccines by citizens who are ill-disposed to be inoculated with same is a larger subject to deal with. The Federal Government’s target is a good one, however, demanding coordinated measures to strategically make the target a possibility and not mere intention.
