1m expired COVID-19 vaccines to be destroyed in public, Health agency says

The executive director of the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) Faisal Shuaib, said on Monday that around one million expired doses of the COVID-19 vaccine would be destroyed in public

Ripples Nigeria had reported that, on December 8, expired doses were detected with around one million said to have expired in November.

The Federal Government had attributed the development to the short shelf life of the vaccines.

During a media briefing, Shuaib affirmed that the Federal Government was working within established protocol to destroy the expired vaccines.

He said: “The expired vaccines had actually been withdrawn way ahead of when they were supposed to expire. And NAFDAC was consulted.

Read also: Nigeria planning COVID-19 vaccine manufacturing hub —Mamora

“So, we’re working with NAFDAC to schedule a date for when this destruction will take place. There are protocols that NAFDAC and the Abuja environmental protection agency will have to go through.

“Once all of those are aligned, we’ll communicate to the general populace and particularly to the media when that destruction will take place so that it will take place in the full glare of the general public so Nigerians will know that these vaccines were carefully safeguarded and are being destroyed because there is no intention to use them.”

Shuaib stressed that “no person in Nigeria has ever and will ever be vaccinated with expired vaccines.”

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