The Kwara Government has commenced COVID-19 mass vaccination across the 16 local government areas of the state.

Mr. Kayode Alabi, the Deputy Governor of the state, launched the campaign on Tuesday in Ilorin.

Alabi said the COVID19 pandemic has devastated the world economy and unfortunately it still remained a major public health challenge.

He noted that the administration has taken bold and proactive steps since the advent of the pandemic by building a standard treatment center and provision of a conducive and safe work environment to its crop of well-trained health workers.

According to him, the training is in different required specialties providing services to COVID-19 positive patients admitted into the treatment center.

“The arrival of COVID-19 vaccine brought a sigh of relief as we know, like other Vaccine-Preventable Diseases, COVID-19 vaccine will reduce the number of illnesses and deaths from the disease.

“The Kwara Government will leave no stone unturned to see that the introduction of the vaccine in the state suffered no hitch by promptly releasing counterpart funds to aid the implementation,” he said.

Alabi, therefore, appealed to the residents to avail themselves of the ongoing mass COVID-19 vaccine to ensure protection against the virus by getting themselves vaccinated.

He explained that the vaccines have been adjudged to be safe and devoid of serious adverse events following immunization.

“I, therefore, encourage all Kwarans to get themselves protected by getting the vaccines,” he urged.

Dr. Raji Razaq, the state Commissioner for Health, said that the government is demonstrating utmost concern about the people’s health and is doing everything according to international best practices to promote the health of the citizenry.

Raji, who was represented by Dr. Abubakar Ayinla, the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Health, disclosed that the government has improved on the salaries of medical workers as salary packages have been adjusted and the feedback from the state doctors are good.

He reiterated the commitment of the government to do all that is necessary to improve the health of the people in the state.

Earlier in her welcome address, Dr. Nusirat Elelu, the Executive Secretary of the state Primary Health Care Agency, said that the main objective of the campaign was to curb the further spread of COVID-19.

She said that the available COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective against the disease, adding that currently about 400,000 doses of AstraZeneca and Moderna vaccines have been administered in Kwara.

According to her, despite the huge number of people vaccinated in the state, health workers have not documented any serious adverse event following the immunization.

“The National Primary Health Care Development Agency has an ambitious but double target of vaccinating at least 50 percent of the population with the COVID-19 vaccines before the end of January 2022.

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“One of the strategies put in place to scale up the number of vaccinated individuals is the mass vaccination strategy,” she said.

She added that over 15,000 individuals have been vaccinated since March 2021.