Our Reporter

The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) on Friday gave the Pfizer Biotech Vaccine the nod for emergency use authorisation for COVID-19 in the country.

Director-General of the agency, Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, told reporters in Lagos that the vaccine has been approved for possible use in the country.

“Our COVID-19 vaccine team must carefully review it to make sure that the science behind it is well understood, and also in accordance with our own regulation,” she said.

She said the vaccine was approved based on different mechanisms known to the agency.

“We used different mechanisms to approve COVID-19 vaccine, and one of it is called reliance, meaning that a more matured regulatory agency across the globe has already approved such a vaccine.

“We can use that as a basis for our own review by getting the assessment report, know the peculiarities and our COVID Vaccine Committee will then do their job.

Read Also; WHO secures 40m doses of Pfizer vaccine as global cases near 100m

“We also can go ahead to review, if the World Health Organisation (WHO) has given emergency use lifting, meaning they have done their job.

“For Pfizer Biotech vaccine, both cases are through, because more matured agencies have approved the vaccine.

“The approval is not a full approval; it is within the period of getting people vaccinated and gathering of data about the adverse effect following immunisation,” she said.

Adeyeye said that data gathering on vaccines was not limited to NAFDAC.

She said the agency belonged to an organisation called International Coalition of Medicine Regulatory Authorities (ICMRA).

According to her, the agency’s COVID-19 Vaccine Committee has worked to ensure that post vaccination regulation is put in place.

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