…commences mass vaccination with 88 designed centres

By Gabriel Olawale

Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu on Friday received its COVID-19 vaccination jab at the infection Disease Centre, Yaba along with his Deputy, Dr Obafemi Hamzat; Commissioner for Health, Prof. Akin Abayomi and Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Gbenga Omotoso.

The governor after receiving his jab said he did not feel any pain even as he encourages Lagos residents to come forward to take their vaccine, “I will also like to seize this opportunity to admonished our people in Lagos State not to spread fake information on the vaccination.

It will be recalled that the Lagos State government took delivery of the first consignment of 507,742 vaccines allocated to it by the Federal Government on March 9.

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Earlier, addressing a press conference at the Infectious Disease Hospital, Yaba, Commissioner for Health and Deputy Covid-19 Incident Commander, Professor Akin Abayomi, who was the first person in Lagos to receive his jab, announced that in line with the process laid down by the Federal Government, the administration of the vaccines has been scheduled into four phases, with frontline health workers topping the list.

Others in that category include the Military, Port Healthy authorities, The Police, Judiciary and Rapid Response Workers, the aged, and those with co-morbidities. He pointed out that eighty-eight sites have been mapped out for the administration of the vaccine.

He urged those who meet the outlined phase one criteria to register to be vaccinated through the State Portal from Monday next week.

Abayomi re-emphasized that the vaccination was to boost immunity and there is no guarantee that those vaccinated would not be infected with coronavirus again, “people are expected to take two doses up to 12 weeks apart. We know that after your first dose you can achieve up to 60 per cent protection and after the second dose it can rise to as high as 80 per cent.

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“Vaccination does not guarantee that you cannot contact COVID-19 again, there is still a possibility that you can contract the virus but the chances of you developing cold morbidity and critical situation are significantly diminished if you have achieved this level of immunity.

Abayomi appealed to Lagos residents and Nigerians, in general, to make themselves available for vaccination when more vaccines become available.

In his remarks, the commissioner for information and strategy, Gbenga Omotoso, renewed the appeal to residents to continue to take preventive measures and urged media organisations to continue advocacy on the need for residents to get vaccinated.

Meanwhile, pregnant women and children under the age of eighteen are excluded from COVID-19 vaccine administration. Abayomi disclosed that clinical test is still ongoing to know the stage of pregnancy to which the vaccine will be safe for mothers.

However, the commissioner noted that women who are yet to get pregnant but are expectant are free to take the vaccine.

Vanguard News Nigeria