The Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Muhammad Pate, has explained some of the reasons for the delay in Nigeria’s efforts to manufacture vaccines locally.
Pate, speaking Wednesday morning while appearing on a Channels Television programme, said the country needed to get more resources to achieve the target. .
According to him, local production of vaccines is imperative to strengthen the health sector, noting that Nigeria cannot immediately commence local production without marshalling adequate resources from all fronts.
Pate said since the outbreak of COVID-19, the Nigerian government began efforts to boost local production of medical equipment needed to address disease outbreaks.
He said the government responded to the disease by making considerable investments in the public health system and sought to boost local production.
He said: “The effort we are making now to improve primary health care and strengthen testing capabilities, human and other resources of the National Center for Disease Control (NCDC) began during COVID-19.
“But we need to go beyond that. We also need to produce some of the equipment that we need during those outbreaks, and that requires enormous resources.”
Article page with financial support promotion
Vaccine for COVID-19
The minister said that the fund reserved for the production of COVID-19 vaccine is still intact and efforts are being made to gather more sufficient resources to start production.
In 2021, the federal government allocated N10 billion for the local production of coronavirus vaccines through Bio Vaccine Nigeria Limited, a Nigerian pharmaceutical company.
“We are working to develop our vaccines. Nigeria is exploring options for licensed production in collaboration with recognized institutions. “We are also exploring the option of local production of vaccines in the country,” the government had said then.
In this regard, Pate said that this decision was aimed at domesticating manufacturing capabilities. However, he noted, “the money has been there and has not been used.”
He said: “When we arrived, we decided that the resources should be used for their intended purposes. But through the appropriate government entity that owns government shares in Bio Vaccines Nigeria Limited.
“The money is intact and still available to the company,” he said.
The minister further noted that the funds available at this time may not be sufficient for the company to start manufacturing. “It still has to mobilize resources from other areas.”
He said: “Last week, we were invited to talk to the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Bio Vaccines to discuss how they can be assisted so that Nigeria can get on the path of vaccine manufacturing.
“We need to do more. We need to improve our local production capacity. The previous government did the best it could and the administration is taking advantage of that to take things to the next level.”