No fewer than 4,680,000 million Nigerian residents have so far been vaccinated against COVID-19, NewsSpecng learnt.
The Executive Director, National Primary Health Care Development Agency, Faisal Shuaib, disclosed this in Benin during the South-South town hall meeting on COVID-19 vaccination organised by the Presidential Steering Committee on COVID in collaboration with the NPHCDA.
Shuaib also said out of the figure, 1,865,127 of them have been fully vaccinated with two doses.
He said the meeting was to discuss COVID-19 vaccination, address concerns, reach a consensus, and support the on-going efforts by the federal and state governments to ensure citizens are safe and protected against the deadly virus.
Despite the success recorded, he stated that the present statistics is below target of reaching herd immunity and allow people return to their former lives.
He attributed the reason of not meeting the set target to misinformation about the virus and the vaccines, noting conspiracy theory has vaccines hesitancy.
He said: “Despite the numbers of those vaccinated, it is below our target of reaching herd immunity and this prevents us from returning to normal living.”
“Today, as it stands, we are not only fighting COVID-19 pandemic, but we are also fighting large scale misinformation and disinformation, which has led to significant vaccination hesitancy all over the world, while the disease keeps claiming lives.
“To ensure vaccine security and accountability, NPHCDA is also collaborating with the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC)” he said.
