The virologist, who is also a member of the World Health Organisation Technical Advisory Group on COVID-19 Vaccine Composition, noted that though the checks were to be relaxed from this month, Nigerians would still go on quarantine with full vaccination because the AstraZeneca vaccine deployed by Nigeria is not recognised by the United Kingdom.
He observed that those fully vaccinated with Covishield vaccines would still need to quarantine due to an issue with certification, adding: “I think it is important to check the criteria used by the UK in classifying countries into the red amber and green categories. These are rates of COVID-19 infection, percentage of people being vaccinated, the prevalence of COVID-19 variants and access to reliable genomic sequencing.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and WHO Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in a statement, yesterday, said by working with COVAX, African Vaccine Acquisition Trust and other partners, the world can and must meet the targets to vaccinate 40 per cent of the population of all countries by the end of this year and 70 per cent by mid-2022.