Kenneth Afor
The Federal Government has said the Lagos State government stands at the risk of being barred from getting further COVID-19 Vaccines over rumours that the state is using a separate platform to enrol persons for vaccination.
This was disclosed by Dr. Faisal Shuaib, Executive Director, National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA), who spoke on an NTA programme on Wednesday.
Dr Shaibu said, “If it turns out after our investigation that Lagos State has a different platform and they are using it for this process, then they stand the risk of actually being barred from getting further vaccines. These vaccines are being provided by COVAX, and have been donated by different organisations and they are very clear about accountability for the vaccines.
“If Lagos State is using a different platform, then we cannot account for those vaccines the way they are supposed to be accounted for. And if we cannot account for the vaccines, the donors will be very clear that we cannot send vaccines to those states.”
However, Professor Akin Abayomi, the Lagos State Commissioner for Health, had complained that the platform set up by the NPHCDA which the state government used have been using at numerous occasions failed to pre-register residents, adding that the government had continued to engage the IT staff of the Federal Government agency to resolve the issue.
He said: “Lagos has been using the NPHCDA platform. The platform has on numerous occasion failed to pre-register residents and schedule citizens in an orderly manner.”
But Dr. Shuaibu said that the platform is working very well, but noted that there are times when the platform will have issues saying that it is a normal situation where a lot of people are trying to register.
According to him, the information the agency has received from the state was that people who were not eligible are going through the back door to meet with the state officials to get vaccinated.
He said that the agency will reach out to the state government to get a first hand of the information.
“No state will also be allowed to procure vaccines on their own. This is a policy of the Federal Government. I hope that it is not correct that they have a different website because that will be wrong on the part of the commissioner of health. And that means that he has not been communicating honestly with the Federal Government. But I know him to be a man of good standing in terms of his interactions. We will have to investigate, but it will be a very bad development if they developed a different platform.
“The platform that NPHCDA and our development partners have developed is a platform that is working very well. There are times when it will have issues but that happens with every situation where there are internet challenges and where a lot of people are trying to access a platform. This platform has been optimised.
“This is part of a pilot for a larger-scale rollout that we are expecting. So whatever teething problems that we are having right now, it is better we fix them because this is a two-year potential programme of vaccinating over 100 million Nigerians. This is just less than two weeks and so whatever challenges we are facing right now, we need not quit. We must be resilient to fix whatever issues that come up and move together as a country.
“I will be reaching out to the governor of the State to find out if this information provided is correct – it will be very unfortunate if it is.
“The information that we have is that people who are not eligible in this first phase of the COVID-19 vaccination are going through the back doors in collusion with officials of the Lagos State Ministry of Health and they are actually accessing the vaccine,” he said.
The NPHCDA boss clarified that the vaccination is in four phases: the first phase is for the frontline health workers and related workers, the elderly, those with underlying health conditions for the third phase and anybody who is 18 years and above for the fourth and final phase.
He, however, noted that in some clinics in Lagos State the framework is not being followed.
He said: “We have been very clear that we have phased the process of accessing these vaccines into four. The first phase is for those frontline health workers, their support staff and other health workers, and first responders, that is, people who are likely to come in frequent contact with crowds. We have also pointed out that because we need our strategic leaders to symbolically take the vaccines by actually indicating the safety and effectiveness of the vaccines, they are also categorised in the first phase.
“The second phase is for those individuals who are elderly, – those who are 50 years and above. The third phase is for those who have comorbidities – people who have underlying diseases that are likely to worsen when they contract COVID-19. These are people who have hypertension, diabetes and heart disease. The fourth phase is for anybody who is 18 years and above.
“What we are getting from the reports so far is that there are some centres in Lagos, particularly the Falomo Clinic, where this framework is not being followed.
“The information that I got from the Lagos State Government is that this is being investigated. We had hoped that the report would be available before now, but again we checked back yesterday (Tuesday) and realised they were just finalising the report.
“The case in Falomo matters because it sends a very negative signal that there is lawlessness and that we are people who are not following guidelines. If we allow it to go unabated, then it becomes a situation where all comers will want the vaccines. What we are seeing is that contrary to all the social media hypes that the vaccines are not going to be taken, we see a lot of demand for the vaccines actually.
“We have a situation where the common saying is that Lagos is the Centre of Excellence and the commercial nerve centre of Nigeria. I think this crisis around the management of vaccines will be a litmus test as to whether Lagos is also the North Star when it comes to integrity, ethics and implementation of our programmes. and I know the governor is on top of the situation and the Commissioner is trying to resolve this issue.”
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