NPHCDA asks governors to make Covid-19 vaccination compulsory for all civil servants

NIGERIA'S National Primary Healthcare Development Agency (NPHCDA) has urged all state governments to step up the mass vaccination of its employees against Covid-19 as part of a nationwide programme to curtail the spread of the virus.

Although spared the worst of the pandemic with infection rates very low, Nigeria's response to the pandemic in the form of vaccination has been very weak. Only about 4.2% of the Nigerian population has been fully vaccinated so far, while only 9.8% of the population have been given their first dose of the vaccine.

In its latest advisory note, the NPHCDA urged governors to enact and enforce vaccination laws for local and state government workers. Despite the increasing number of cases and deaths, some states have not vaccinated up to 200,000 individuals while Abia, Kogi and Niger states have not commenced administration of booster shots.

Akwa Ibom, Anambra, Benue, Ebonyi, Imo, Kwara, Sokoto and Yobe states have yet to administer boosters shits to up to 100 residents. While Imo has only administered 10 booster shots, Ebonyi has just given 52, with Akwa Ibom only administering 67.

Faced with this low level of vaccination, the NPHCDA has urged states to set up mass vaccination sites in markets. It has told governors that it is part of their responsibility to enact and to enforce vaccine mandate on state and local government workers.

In October, Boss Mustapha, the secretary to the government of the federation, announced that federal government workers who failed to show proof of vaccination would be barred from government offices. NPHCDA director Dr Faisal Shauib, then added that individuals who refused to get vaccinated would not be allowed to infect other people.

Nigeria's Presidential Steering Committee went ahead to issue a vaccination mandate to federal civil servants, stating that staff without proof of vaccination and negative PCR tests would not be allowed into their respective offices as of December 1, 2021. As a result,. many of them were turned back, while others had to visit makeshift vaccination sites to get vaccinated.

In Kaduna and Ondo states the governments  also enforced vaccine mandates. However, in a fresh advisory note, the NPHCDA has advised all 36 governors to extend this vaccination to all state and local government workers.