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COVID-19: FG To Vaccinate 103m Nigerians For Free

The Federal Government has made provision in the 2021 budget to pay for the vaccination of around 103 million Nigerians or 50 percent of the population against Covid-19.

Director-General of the Budget Office of the Federation Ben Akabueze made this disclosure in Abuja on Tuesday during the budget 2021 budget breakdown.

According to Akabueze: “There is a global alliance to support economically weak nations with vaccines, our understanding of the current plan is that we will be getting vaccines donations to cover up to 20 percent of our population but then the global standards say that to achieve herd immunity you have to vaccine at least 70 percent of the population and so there is a 50 percent of the population that we may be required to pay for their own vaccination.”

Already, there is an “inter-ministerial committee looking at this matters and the assurance is that government will do whatever is needful to keep the citizens and economy safe even if it means coming back with a supplementary budget”.

The National Assembly reviewed the 2021 budget upward by N500 billion to accommodate the purchase and distribution of vaccines against coronavirus.