By Asmau Ahmad
The Global Vaccine Alliance (GAVI) has urged government to build resilient health system that will guard against all forms of public health threats.
Chief Executive Officer of Gavi, Dr Seth Berkley made the call in an interview with newsmen in Abuja.
He said that resilient health system would sustain progress toward health security, maintaining building resilient health system would also be a step in the right direction to improving the country’s health security.
According to him, it is the system that will deliver whatever the countermeasures are in the country.
Dr Berkley, who said that Nigeria also had Ebola, Cholera and Measles outbreak in the last two years, in addition to COVID-19 pandemic, advised government on the need for continuous protection going forward.
He also advised that it was necessary the country ensured strong health budget to support a resilient health system in delivering COVID-19 vaccines “and prepare for the inevitable next pandemic.”
He added that Gavi would be looking at working with Federal Government for continuous strengthening of its system on vaccines.
He announced that Nigeria had fully paid its counterpart funding financing with Gavi.
Berkley noted that “the critical issue here is to make sure that the counterpart funding financing comes as early as possible because it actually pays for vaccines. What we do not want to have is stock outs.”
Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, is a public–private global health partnership with the goal of increasing access to immunisation in poor countries.
