Lagos Distributes COVID-19 Vaccine From Wednesday August 25
Lagos State will start to distribute from Wednesday, over 300,000 Moderna vaccines it collected from the Federal Government to boost its drive to achieve immunity.
Nigeria last week took deliveries of some vaccines from the United Kingdom being one of the 11 countries in Africa earmarked for vaccine donation.
Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu disclosed while confirming that the state has recorded 135 fatalities in the current third wave of the pandemic, highlighting the havoc being wreaked by deadly strains of the virus spreading in the country.
The test positivity rate which has also increased to 12.1 per cent in the past weeks, from the seven per cent recorded at the end of July 2021, resulted from non-adherence to the laid-down health protocols designed to stop the spread of the pandemic.
Sanwo-Olu said the situation called for more responsibility, urging the residents to adhere to the preventive protocols put in place by the Government.
“We are now clearly in the middle of the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic and Lagos has remained the epicentre of the disease in Nigeria. Test positivity rate currently stands at 12.1 per cent, compared to 1.1 per cent at the end of June, and seven per cent at end of July. About 4,387 positive cases are currently being managed actively in-community as of August 21″.
“Over the course of managing the COVID-19 pandemic, about 5,551 patients have been admitted into our various COVID-19 care centres in Lagos, with 506 registered fatalities. Of these deaths, 135 have sadly, happened in this current third wave. I commiserate with all residents who have lost loved ones to the pandemic. We share in your pain and grief. As a society and as a Government, it is for us to redouble our efforts to defeat this devastating pandemic.”
The increment in positive cases has also shot up oxygen demand at the Government-controlled isolation centres, with the State supplying 400 cylinders daily to patients with severe cases.
At the beginning of the third wave, 75 cylinders were consumed per day at the isolation centres.
Sanwo-Olu said the State would be ramping up its oxygen plants in the coming days, as he projected that the demand for oxygen may shoot up in the next few weeks.
From next Wednesday, the Governor said Lagos would start the distribution of the first dose of Moderna vaccine across 150 centres set up in the State for the exercise. Increasing vaccination, the Governor said, will stem cases of fatalities, urging residents to get the vaccine.
He said: “In terms of treatment of severe cases, we have seen a gradual increase in the uptake of oxygen during the current wave. Utilization has increased from 75 cylinders per day at the beginning of this third wave, to over 400 cylinders per day, currently. We are exploring several ways of increasing our oxygen capacity because our modelling suggests that we may be required to supply even more oxygen over the next few weeks”.
“One of the major pillars of our mitigation strategy for the third wave is vaccination. We are seeing that countries that have vaccinated a large percentage of their population are recording drastic reductions in the numbers of COVID-19 related deaths. This is one of the reasons why we have not spared any cost to ensure that the vaccines that have been provided by the Federal Government are made available to every resident that meets the requirements for the vaccination programme.”
As part of the strategy to stem the cases, Sanwo-Olu said the State Government identified 5,998 Persons of Interest and had successfully isolated 4,500 of them, most of whom arrived from red-listed countries.
