As countries around the world make attempts to discover the Vaccine for COVID-19, the Director-General of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, NCDC, Chikwe Ihekweazu has given a hint about when it is possible to have the vaccine in the country.
According to the Director-General, there are a lot of ongoing programmes on COVID-19 vaccine research.
Chikwe, who revealed this while speaking during the virtual weekly briefing of the African Centre for Disease Control stated that a vaccine may be available within the next six to 12 months.
However, he said the country had not experienced an explosion of cases against predictions by some models during the initial days of the outbreak.
He also linked the high cases of the virus in Lagos to its large population and influx of international travellers into the country at the onset of the outbreak.
COVID-19 Vaccine
However, he revealed that the country had so far tested 250, 000 persons for COVID-19 adding that Nigeria now has 60 molecular testing centres across the country.
The NCDC boss further stated that 85% of the 36 states of the country now have testing centres.
Chikwe, who enjoined Nigerians to stick to health guidelines against COVID-19 described prevention as key in Nigeria’s response to the disease.
Meanwhile, the Director, Africa CDC, Dr John Nkengasong has enjoined all African countries to establish centres for disease control.
It was gathered that as of Thursday, July 30, 55 Member States in Africa have reported 891,199 cases of COVID-19, 18,884 deaths and 540,872 recoveries.
