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The first batch of the expected COVAX Astrazeneca/Oxford vaccines has just arrived in Nigeria. The National Primary Health Care Development Agency made the announcement on its official Twitter handle on Tuesday, where it was revealed that the 3.92 million doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine, manufactured by the Serum Institute of India coronavirus vaccine landed at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja, March 2, 2021. Some Officials of the government and Presidential Task Force on Covid-19 were present at the airport to receive the vaccines. They include; the Chairman of the Boss Mustapha, the DG of the NPHCDA, Dr Faisal Shuaib, the Minister for Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire, and the DG of the Nigeria Centre for Diseases Control, NCDC, Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu.

It is unrealistic to think that the world will be done with the Covid-19 pandemic by the end of the year, the WHO said Monday. The World Health Organization’s emergency director Michael Ryan said it might be possible to take the sting of tragedy out of the coronavirus crisis by reducing hospitalizations and deaths. But the virus remains very much in control, he added, especially given that global new case numbers increased this week after seven consecutive weeks of decline.

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) for the first time in six months has recorded the lowest daily infection of only 240 cases yesterday.

The Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) and Chairman of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19, Boss Mustapha has on Saturday disclosed that Nigeria will be receiving the first tranche of the COVID-19 vaccine on March 2.
Mustapha made this known during the daily PTF on COVID-19 press briefing in Abuja. “Nigeria is set to receive its first four million shipment of COVID-19 vaccines from COVAX. “The vaccines should depart India on March 1, 2021 in the night and arrive Abuja on the 2nd of March, 2021.”

Ghana today took delivery of COVID-19 vaccines from the COVAX facility thereby becoming the first African country to receive the 600,000 Oxford-AstraZeneca doses. The vaccines from the global effort to boost access to doses arrived in the capital Accra Wednesday morning. The World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Africa made this known via Twitter. In the tweet WHO said the delivery is the first wave of arrivals to continue in the coming days. Ghana’s government said this in a statement on Wednesday “The government of Ghana is taking delivery of 60,000 doses of AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine made by the Serum Institute of India (Covishield).”

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has on Monday disclosed that a new variant of the COVID-19 has been detected in Nigeria and 15 other countries. The new variant “B.1.2.5” is different from the highly infectious “B.1.1.7” variant, and is yet to be described as a variant of concern. This was made known by the Director-General, NCDC, Dr. Chikwe Iheakweazu during the daily Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 briefing in Abuja, saying researchers and scientists are working to understand the effects of the variant as well as its transmissibility, immunity, diagnostics, vaccines, and therapeutics.