From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja
American billionaire and Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, has pledged to commit $7 billion to support routine immunisation, fight against hunger, poverty and gender inequality in Nigeria and other African countries.
The fund which will be expended through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation would be released over the next four years.
According to Gates, the new fund is necessary because of the reduced amount of aid intervention flowing to Africa due to the Russian-Ukraine crisis.
The sum is about 40 per cent higher when compared with the previous four years.
In a post shared on the Twitter platform, Bill noted that Africa has been at the heart of his foundation.
“Today, we are announcing our commitment of $7 billion over the next four years for the development of more breakthrough innovations in health and agriculture across the continent,” the tweet read.
He also added that Nigeria has made significant progress in reaching its health goals, including recently eradicating wild polio from the country.
Nigeria, became polio-free in August 2020. The United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) made the announcement in a televised programme.
While pledging his continued support, Bill noted that his foundation works with the Nigerian government and other partners to help address a range of health issues, including family planning, nutrition, and strengthening primary health care and public health.
“Our foundation will continue to support solutions in health, agriculture, and other critical areas—and the systems to get them out of the labs and to the people who need them,” the tweet revealed.
Meanwhile, Vice President Kashim Shettima has assured that the President Bola Tinubu’s administration is set to address the concerns that surround the financing of primary healthcare system in the country.
He gave the assurance at a parley with governors from the 36 states of the federation under the auspices of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum at the State House Conference Centre, Abuja.
In attendance were the co-Chairman of Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, and the Chairman of Dangote Foundation, Aliko Dangote.
The meeting is part of the Gates Foundation’s commitment to work closely with communities and leaders to support innovation that can help accelerate progress and improve lives across Africa.
Gates had, on Monday, met with President Tinubu as part of the programme to learn from partners helping to address polio, anaemia, and other health threats; scientists applying research to develop agricultural innovations that will help with food security and climate adaptation; innovators using technology to improve access to financial services; and others working to improve lives in Niger and Nigeria and throughout the continent.
Gates and his delegation had also been scheduled to meet with national and regional leaders to encourage them to make investments and advance policies that promote innovation and provide equitable opportunity, despite challenging economic conditions.
He was similarly expected to participate in a conversation with students and young leaders to gather insights and share perspectives on how science and innovation can accelerate positive change and contribute to a brighter outlook for Africa.
A statement by Director Information, Office of the Vice President, quoted Shettima as saying polio is one of the major primary healthcare challenges in the country.
“The proposal is to provide timely domestic financing for the procurement of vaccines, which could not have come sooner, to boosting our industrial capacity to produce vaccines.”
The vice president while acknowledging the threats facing Nigeria in the area of polio, averred that Nigeria’s three dose pentavalent vaccine coverage has improved from 33 per cent in 2016 to 57 per cent in 2021.
He said: “The variant polio virus has declined in Nigeria by 84 per cent from 2021, falling to fewer than 200 cases in 2022. He, therefore, commended the states that have achieved high category immunisation coverage, which is between 60 per cent and 80 per cent of the target demographic and the number of states has expanded from 12 to 21 states in five years.
“The Federal Government and our respective state governments are going to set in place a transparent process and structure to undo the reality of the country as one with one of the highest proportions of non-immunised infants in the world over the last decade.”
He said the Federal Government is “committed to eradicating variant poliovirus by the end of the year ensuring every Nigerian child is covered in the routine immunisation campaigns.”
On the issue of production of vaccines for immunisation of children, he assured that “we are going to work together to ensure these vaccines are made available even to zero-dose children, of which ours, at two million, are the highest in the world after India.”
He expressed government’s appreciation to partners such as Alhaji Aliko Dangote’s Foundation and that of Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, whose empathy shone through that uncertain period in the nation’s history.
Dangote said Gates and himself have been partnering both the federal and state governments for several years, supporting the efforts in eradicating polio and improving routine immunisation, nutrition and primary healthcare in the country.
In separate remarks, Chairman of Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Abdulraman Abdulrazaq, and some governors who spoke at the parley lauded the philanthropic interventions of the Dangote and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundations in critical areas, including healthcare, education, agriculture and human capital development.
The governors assured of their readiness to further collaborate with the Dangote and Gates Foundations in the coming years.