The Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, has stated that the agency is collaborating with global partners to guarantee that Nigeria receives vaccines with a longer expiration date.
She was speaking in the wake of NAFDAC, the National Primary Health Care Development Agency, and the Abuja Environmental Protection Agency destroying 1,066,214 doses of vaccines that expired in November and were incinerated at the Gosa Dumping site in Abuja last week.
Owing to logistical concerns, Adeyeye informed the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos that the expired vaccines had a short expiration date, making it hard to administer them on time.
“We didn’t have access to vaccines for some months after developed countries began using them, until we began to receive donations, not just from COVAX but also from other countries.”
There wasn’t enough time between when we tested it and when we started utilizing it, and that was the main reason, not because we were negligent.
“However, moving forward, we’re cooperating with international partners to guarantee that any vaccine we receive has a five- to six-month expiration date.”
The D-G stated that investigations on the new Omicron variant of COVID-19 are still being conducted worldwide.
She urged Nigerians to continue following the safety precautions outlined by the various health authorities in order to prevent the virus from spreading further.
“A lot about Omicron is still unknown because research on the variant is still ongoing around the world.
“Truly the best way to stay safe is to keep wearing masks, maintaining social distance, washing our hands frequently, and avoiding crowded places.”
She also stated that by 2025, NAFDAC plans to reduce drug importation from 70% to 30%.
This, she suggested, might be accomplished by increasing drug manufacturing on a local and national level.
Increasing local drug production, according to Adeyeye, will help to reduce the prevalence of counterfeit drugs and guarantee drug security in the country.
“To combat substandard and fake drugs in the country, we are employing a variety of strategies.”
“If a country is overly reliant on drug importation, it will receive substandard drugs, and we would not have awoken from our sleep as a country if it wasn’t for COVID-19.”
“When I first started my tenure, local drug production became a priority since boosting local manufacturing creates more jobs and raises GDP.”
“Most notably, you are protecting the nation’s health because, for instance, if someone is trying to fake something on Ota, we would rush there in less an hour, and that something similar has happened previously.”
“Therefore, by 2025, we aim to reduce drug importation into the country from 70% to 30%, so that as a nation, we can proclaim we have drug security, which we don’t have currently.” A country that isn’t drug-free isn’t secure in any other way.”
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