Continuing its advocacy on public-private partnership to bring the health sector to global standards, Healthcare Federation of Nigeria (HFN) is canvassing for the involvement of the private sector in the vaccine rollout.
The call came at a recent emergency meeting on the COVID-19 vaccine rollout to discuss issues around the low uptake of the vaccine amongst healthcare workers.
Experienced COVID-19 healthcare professionals from the diaspora, and leaders of healthcare associations in Nigeria, including the Healthcare Providers Association of Nigeria (HCPAN) attended the meeting.
Igho Ofotokun, one of the professionals from Emory University School of Medicine who is involved in the clinical trials of the vaccine, said the clinical trials proved to be 100 percent effective on African American patients and therefore, Nigerian healthcare workers should be confident that taking the vaccine will protect them from the COVID-19 virus.
He also noted that “the extent of long term effects of the COVID-19 virus on the human body are still being studied, so the benefits of taking the vaccines far outweigh the negatives.”
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Last month, Nigeria received 3.92 million doses of the vaccine developed by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca vaccines through COVAX, a global scheme formed to ensure fair access to inoculations for low and middle-income states.
The vaccines were allocated by the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) to almost all the states in Nigeria and vaccination commenced, beginning with the frontline health and essential workers through public sector hospitals only.
As of April 6, 2021, approximately 965,000 people have been vaccinated representing 48.0 percent of the targeted population to be vaccinated in this first phase.
At the meeting, stakeholders attributed the shortfall to a high level of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among healthcare workers due to the suspension in several countries as a result of reported blood clots, infertility, and other conspiracy theories circulating in social media.
Some healthcare workers have reported their inability to get enough time off work to get the vaccine, there have also been reports of the vaccines being sold to ineligible members of the population who are not in the first vaccination phase.
Other reasons relate to the technology platform including failure during the registration process, no return email confirming date and time of appointment, QR barcodes generated post vaccination were said not to be linked to any patient information to name a few.
As the advocacy body of the private healthcare sector stakeholders, HFN has on several occasions engaged NPHCDA to allow private sector healthcare organizations to support the government’s efforts to accelerate vaccine uptake, and while there was a positive acknowledgement of this request, not much traction has been achieved.
The participation of the private health sector has been seen to yield results in many developed countries, so, the participants believe that harnessing the power of the private sector could help decentralize and accelerate vaccinations amongst the populace.
“It is only with the involvement of the private sector can Nigeria accelerate the vaccination programme,” Egbe Osifo-Dawodu, a doctor and participant at the meeting.
Reiterating the importance of private sector involvement to increase uptake to facilitate the speedy reopening of the economy; Asue Ighodalu, chairman of Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG); said the private sector should be allowed to participate in the vaccine administration process using a similar template to that used for the COVID-19 testing in Lagos State, where private sector players are permitted to charge controlled pricing.
He said this would allow the government to focus more on regulation and ensuring safety of the vaccination program.
In his view, HFN’s financial secretary, Adeyemi Adewole, argued that out-of-pocket payment for the COVID-19 vaccine should be encouraged for those who can afford it as is being done in various countries such as in Dubai and India.
“There is clearly pent-up demand for the vaccine as there are reported cases of people offering money to be vaccinated and many large Corporates anxious to pay for vaccines to protect their staff,” he said.
The interactive session was opened by the HFN president, Pamela Ajayi, and anchored by the vice president, Njide Ndili.
