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NAFDAC Gives Fresh Update, Warns Nigerians On Astrazeneca Vaccine

The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has called on Nigerians to ensure that the AstraZeneca vaccine administered on them has the original label.
According to NAFDAC, the warning became imperative to ensure that people did not risk being vaccinated with fake AstraZeneca vaccine.

The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has enjoined Nigerians to ensure that the AstraZeneca vaccine administered on them has the original label.

The agency gave the advice via a statement by the NAFDAC’s director-general, Mojisola Adeyeye, on Sunday.

According to NAFDAC, the warning became imperative to ensure that people did not risk being vaccinated with fake AstraZeneca vaccine.

The agency explained that the original Oxford AstraZeneca University (AZOU) vaccine had been contracted to Serum Institute of India (SIIPL), largest vaccine manufacturer in the world, to produce in large quantity.

“AZOU gave the license of its vaccine to Serum Institute of India PVT Ltd (SIIPL) to manufacture this vaccine at a commercial scale. SIIPL is the largest vaccine manufacturer in the world and the company got the license by signing the manufacturing agreement.

“SIIPL gave the vaccine the trade name COVISHIELD, it is the result of cooperation and a technology transfer from AstraZeneca – University of Oxford to SIIPL.

“SIIPL is now the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer by number of doses produced and sold globally.

“More than 1.5 billion doses, which include Polio vaccine, Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis, Hib, BCG, r-Hepatitis B, Measles, Mumps and Rubella.,” Adeyeye said.

The NAFDAC DG added that the vaccines manufactured by SIIPL were accredited by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and are being used in about 170 countries in their national immunisation programme.

Adeyeye stated that both COVISHIELD manufactured by SIIPL and COVID-19 vaccine AstraZeneca, manufactured by AstraZeneca/Oxford University vaccine are the same vaccine.

According to her, ChAdOx1 nCoV- 19 corona virus vaccines (Recombinant), COVISHIELD, were granted emergency use listing (EUL) by the World Health Organisation on February 15, and that it was one of the listed vaccines under the COVAX facility.