Lagos Plans Big For Vaccine Research and Production, Mental Facilities to Boost Healthcare Delivery
The Lagos State Government is set to establish a world-class vaccine research and production centre that will be the best-in-class in Africa.
This is in order to prepare the state and country for attaining new heights in epidemiology and providing vaccines and other curative remedies to outbreaks of viral infections in community and pandemic proportions. This is also to avoid depending on western nations for COVID-19 vaccines.
Also being planned is a world-class mental health facility as part of critical measures to combat the COVID-19 pandemic in the State as well as provide treatment and care to other categories of mental health patients.
These milestone plans were revealed by Mr. Gbenga Omotosho, the Lagos State Commissioner for Information & Strategy said at the 5th Annual Conference of the Guild of Corporate Online Publishers (GOCOP) in Lagos on Thursday.
Mr. Omotosho also said that State Government disbursed over N1 billion to Small & Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) affected by the pandemic through the Lagos State Employment Trust.
Omotosho, who represented Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu, Executive Governor of Lagos State at the conference was noted that businesses are gradually coming back to life even as he conceded that full recovery would be difficult to predict given the still dangerous mode of the virus and the low vaccination levels across state and country.
He however expressed the hope that vaccination rates will soon improve: “During the outbreak of the pandemic, the Lagos State Government set up the Lagos Incident Command to collate vital information and data on the pandemic and thereafter kept Lagosians informed on regular basis. Today, we have 150 vaccination centres from the initial 65 as well as stepped-up advocacy on the need for Lagosians to go for vaccination.”
Omotosho lamented that Africa has been unable to achieve herd immunity, which translates to 60 percent vaccination rate of the population partly due to fake news and conspiracy theories about the pandemic on the continent.
He also praised the media especially, GOCOP affiliated media for their support to combat fake news and vaccine hesitancy: “We have the problem of fake news of the vaccine killing people and therefore not the solution to the COVID-19 pandemic. That is why we appreciate the support of the media in terms of information dissemination about the pandemic. We also need such critical support to combat the fake news about the virus, vaccination and recovery from the pandemic.”
Omotosho congratulated the EXCO and members of GOCOP for huge success of the 5th GOCOP Annual Conference and pledged the continued support of the State Government for GOCOP in the years ahead for being worthy partners in progress.
