The firm said on  April 11 that it was assessing the future demand for Covid-19 vaccines. Moderna’s decision comes after questions over delays in acquiring land for the project in a special economic zone on the outskirts of Nairobi, the country’s capital. 

The company said it has not received vaccine orders from Africa since 2022 and has seen orders worth over $1 billion cancelled as risks associated with the virus wane. 

“Given this, and in alignment with our strategic planning, Moderna believes it is prudent to pause its efforts to build an mRNA manufacturing facility in Kenya. This approach will allow Moderna to better align its infrastructure investments with the evolving healthcare needs and vaccine demand in Africa,” the company said in a statement on Thursday.

Moderna has been working on several other vaccines based on mRNA technology, including cancer, shingles, and HIV. It recently announced a breakthrough in the development of a vaccine for cancer.

The company’s move is a blow to President William Ruto, who, since coming to power, has been courting foreign firms to drive his manufacturing agenda. In 2023, the Moderna deal accounted for the largest portion of Kenya’s $861 million in foreign direct investments (FDI).  

The facility, which was to be Moderna’s first manufacturing plant in Africa, was expected to position Kenya as a pharmaceutical and vaccines hub in the region with a capacity to produce 500 million doses annually.

Both women went to the hospital and there tested positive for COVID-19. They were then placed on medication and advised to self-isolate. Now, their gateman Bosun*, who must have caught the virus from them, thought he had malaria and got on antimalarial medications. But, after a week, his symptoms persisted, so he decided to switch medicines to honey, ginger, and turmeric mixed in hot water, as advised by a friend.

According to the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), Nigeria entered the 4th wave of COVID-19 in December, reporting 223,887 cases and 2,985 deaths in its 36 states and federal capital Abuja. This is an over-500% increase. 

The surge in COVID-19 cases during the December festive period may be attributed to 2 major factors: the mass of unquarantined people that came into Nigeria from abroad, especially into Lagos; and the several crowded gatherings where social distancing practices were not observed.

In the case of Adaobi and her mother, Adaobi had attended several crowded outdoor activities in December and her mother had just returned from a business trip in Europe, so it’s difficult to determine who infected who. 

Like Bosun, many Nigerians are ignorant of the symptoms of COVID-19. On top of that, many people do not see a doctor whenever they feel sick, preferring instead to self-medicate, with the belief that they have “ordinary malaria”. This is what’s currently happening in Lagos and, according to Remedial Health, a healthtech startup that improves access to original medicines by creating a direct supply chain between retailers and manufacturers or registered distributors, Lekki Phase 1—one of the highbrow  areas of Lagos—is at the center of it all.

Remedial Health founder and CEO, Samuel Okwuada, told TechCabal over a call that their company saw a 250% increase in orders for anti-malarial drugs in December last year from pharmacies and chemists in Lekki Phase 1. 

“It started around November but peaked in December. We noticed that customers in Lekki Phase 1 that would normally order 20 packs of antimalarial drugs for sale within 3–4 days were now ordering 60–70 packs every 1–2 days,” said Okwuada. “When we asked the manufacturers for more products and they told us they’d reached their production limit, we realised this is more serious than we thought.”

Drugs like Artemether & Lumefantrine and Vitamin C saw about 250% and 130% increase, respectively, in demand. This continual spike in demand of antimalarial drugs—which is still happening—led Remedial Health to investigate the cause. Their conversations with pharmacists on the frontline suggests that some of the symptoms reported by customers are more consistent with COVID-19 than malaria. 

A sore throat is not indicative of malaria but it is one of the major symptoms of COVID-19.

“The number of COVID-19 cases in Lekki is overwhelming. When these people come to the clinic, they always complain of malaria but test positive for COVID-19,” said a lab scientist who works at a testing centre in Lekki and who spoke to TechCabal anonymously. 

Another resident of Lekki Phase 1 jokingly said he suspects everybody in Lekki has the virus already. “That’s an old story now. It’s just another malaria symptom,” he said.

The importance of data in combating the virus 

It’s no more news that healthcare institutions around the globe are using data to design better pandemic responses and train frontline staff. Without appropriate data, misinformation and conspiracy theories about the virus will flood the media and undermine efforts to sensitise the public. 

The World Health Organisation’s director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, once said, “We’re not just fighting a pandemic; we’re fighting an infodemic.” 

Governments across the world are using data to drive COVID-19 innovation to mend the economic stress, misinformation, and division the virus has unleashed on the world. In Nigeria, the Global Partnership UNECA worked with the country’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) to create a comprehensive data hub to show where cases of COVID-19 were occurring and what support might be needed.

In Togo, the government is using artificial intelligence, via GiveDirect-Novissi COVID-19 Aid, to collect and collate data of the poorest communities in order to provide them with contactless financial aid through mobile money.

According to a Reuter data, COVID-19 infections are decreasing in Nigeria, with 94 new infections reported on average each day. That’s 5% of the peak—the highest daily average reported on December 27. Okwuada, the lab scientist and some Lekki residents that spoke to TechCabal believes that these numbers are underreported and that is evident from the case of people like Bosun. Where’s their own number? However, even though data is not a direct antidote to the virus and not always correct, Okwuada believes it’s a strong fighting instrument. He said data is essential to curbing the spread of the virus and, possibly, ending the disease altogether.

Nigeria’s National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) has teamed up with Gricd—a cold chain technology company—to use the Internet of Things (IoT) to deliver 4.2 million doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine to all 36 states of the country and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.

This news comes on the heels of last month’s announcement when the West African country was reported to have lost about 1 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine. According to a spokesperson for the World Health Organization (WHO), the doses were lost due to their short shelf life—about four-to-six weeks—and Nigeria’s lack of adequate storage facilities. 

Vaccine storage or wastage, however, is a global problem. And as the world struggles to understand the new Omicron variant of the coronavirus—sequestering Africa in the process—it’s becoming increasingly evident just how unvaccinated African countries are, and the factors contributing to the low numbers. 

As of October, only 7.5% of the continent’s population has been fully vaccinated against COVID—a sad figure compared to the EU’s 62% and US’s 55%. While the largest barrier to vaccination in Africa is the purchasing power of most countries, another is the lack of storage and delivery infrastructure. 

Over the course of the year, countries like Malawi, Congo, and South Sudan destroyed thousands of COVID vaccine doses because they couldn’t store them properly or deliver them before their expiry dates. Across Europe, some countries, including Germany and Switzerland have also struggled with administering the vaccine before their expiry dates, with France reportedly destroying 25% of the AstraZeneca and 20% of the Moderna vaccines in April.

Vaccines are temperature-sensitive and must be kept below certain levels in order to maximise their shelf life.  Every year, WHO estimates that 50% of vaccines worldwide are wasted because of inefficient cold storage and cold chain management, and in Africa, the percentage could be higher since about 60% of the population live in rural areas with limited infrastructure.

There are, however, companies that use tech to aid the storage process and Gricd is one. Gricd is a cold chain technology company that provides IoT solutions to enable last-mile delivery of temperature-sensitive products such as vaccines, insulin, and food.  Gricd helps reduce this number through a number of ways including automated real-time monitoring of temperature and data logging during storage, transit and distribution of temperature-sensitive products. The company does this using MOTE, a data logger that transmits information about location, humidity, and temperature in real-time.

The MOTE comes with a built-in GSM antenna to track its location and can last up to 30 days on a single charge. It can be monitored and controlled from anywhere in the world with a mobile phone. Alerts can also be sent via SMS, email, or push notification to relevant parties to inform them and advise on the best next step if the tracked product deviates from their intended route or exceeds the preset temperature range.

With Gricd’s MOTE, Nigeria’s NPHCDA tracked its latest batch of dosages—about 4.2 million doses of Moderna donated by USAID through the COVAX scheme—across all its 36 states and the FCT. NPHCDA also had access to Gricd’s enterprise monitoring dashboard which enabled it to track all the devices in one place, ensuring the vaccines arrived where and as they were intended. 

The vaccines required storage conditions between -15 degrees and -25 degrees and the NPHCDA, using MOTE, was able to monitor the temperature levels. All vaccines were safely delivered and no cases of ineffectiveness were recorded, claimed the NPHCDA.

Commenting on the partnership, Oghenetega Iortim, CEO and co-founder of Gricd, said, “With 36 states and a landmass of more than 900,000 square kilometres to cover, the NPHDCA had its work cut out for it to ensure that the vaccines got to each state in the best condition. There is still a lot of work to be done to protect Nigeria from COVID-19,  but we are glad to have been able to support the governments’ efforts to ensure that more Nigerians have access to critical vaccines. Many African countries have peculiar challenges that often limit access to vaccines and other life-saving medications, and we need to continue to innovate around these challenges to secure lives and livelihoods.”

Africa’s pandemic-induced bid to increase its share of vaccines manufactured in the continent has begun attracting foreign investors.

Already, German and Chinese investors have expressed interest in boosting local production capacity both in terms of funding projects and skills transfer in preparation for a vaccine “revolution”.

Germany-based BioNtech last week affirmed its June plans of bringing its manufacturing to Africa following a meeting with Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame, Senegal’s President Macky Sall and Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission.

The COVID-19 vaccine maker said it has begun evaluating the possibilities of setting up malaria and tuberculosis vaccine production sites in Rwanda and Senegal.

“Our goal is the development of vaccines in Africa and the set-up of sustainable vaccine production capabilities to jointly improve the quality of medical care,” said Ugur Sahin, CEO and co-founder of BioNTech.

BioNtech said it was committed to investing in cutting-edge research and innovation to support vaccine development, the establishment of manufacturing facilities, and the transfer of manufacturing expertise to production sites on the continent.

Werner Hoyer, President of the European Investment Bank welcomed the new partnership saying the lender will “stand ready to provide technical experience and financial backing in the coming months.”

Chinese private sector investors have listed ‘speed up local manufacturing in the African medical industry alongside the unification of African standards’ among key topics for the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC 2021) meeting, scheduled for later in the year.

“Local manufacturing is vital to African economies, a challenge made especially clear with the supply restrictions that have arisen during the COVID19 pandemic,” according to the latest China-Africa Business Council Report, titled, “Market Power and Role of the Private Sector”.

While many African countries have attractive policies for the medical industry, the report says that policies vary greatly among African countries and there is a lack of mutual recognition, which reduces the willingness of foreign-funded enterprises to invest in
Africa on a large scale.

“Establishing the AU and African regional organizations, the African Medicines Agency (AMA) and the AU technical standards certification organization as quickly as possible will be very useful and will complement renewed efforts from the Chinese side to encourage investment in local manufacturing of pharmaceutical and medical products, rather than export,” says the report.

BioNtech focus on Malaria and TB vaccines bodes well with Partnerships for African Vaccine Manufacturing (PAVM) target of prioritising endemic and outbreak-prone diseases including HIV/Aids that accounts for high number of deaths in the continent to increase Africa’s manufacturing from current 1 percent to 60 percent by 2040.

“The ambition is to leverage new technology in support of a sustainable manufacturing industry on the continent. This initiative joins others across the continent in pushing forward this vision,” said John Nkengasong, Director of Africa CDC.

In 2017, African Union heads of state and government committed to end AIDS, TB and malaria by 2030.

In July, the United States International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) in collaboration with the World Bank Group, Germany, and France, announced a joint investment to boost vaccine manufacturing capacity in Africa.

On the cards under this partnership was a financial arrangement that would see a South African business – Aspen Pharmacare – ramp up its manufacturing capacity and produce more than 500 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine by the end of 2022.

A research paper published by the Tony Blaire Institute for Global Change in April shows there are seven other African countries with various capacities, ranging from manufacturing, to fill and finish (the process of filling vials with vaccine and finishing the process of packaging the medicine for distribution), to distribution.

Senegal exports a WHO pre-qualified vaccine, through the Institut Pasteur de Dakar that produces small quantities of yellow fever vaccines while Morocco, Egypt, Tunisia and Ethiopia – are among countries positioned to provide fill and finish.

The Egyptian government’s vaccine manufacturer is reportedly finalizing a public-private deal with Sinovac to produce Covid-19 vaccine.

Nigeria is investing heavily in research and development with plans to leverage a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model to manufacture, among others, COVID-19 and HIV, yellow fever, measles, hepatitis B vaccines.

Vaccine manufacturing in Africa, a report from UK Aid, also shows Algeria has the capacity to do substance manufacturing for rabies vaccine and distribute other imported vaccines.

South Africa, which has historically led much of Africa’s vaccine production through its public-private partnership with Biovac, has over the last five years invested in modernizing facilities and upskilling staff to ramp up manufacturing capacity, says
the paper.

South Africa’s Aspen Pharmacare announced in late July that it had started releasing the first Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccines created at its Gqeberha-based manufacturing site.

The supplies would be “the first COVID-19 vaccines to be produced on the African continent, by an African producer for South African and African patients. Supplies will also be made to the European Union and other offshore markets,” the South African multinational said on its website.

UK Aid estimates Africa’s vaccine market to be worth 1.3 billion dollars, with projections for it to reach a value of 2.35 billion dollars by 2030.

Those are the words of Samia Suluhu Hassan, Tanzania’s president, during a ceremony at the State House in Dar es Salaam.

On Wednesday, Hassan who was sworn in two days after the death of John Magufuli, former president and one of Africa’s most prominent Covid-19 skeptics, launched the country’s Covid-19 vaccination campaign on live TV.

At the event, she took the first vaccination shot ever in the country while the country’s Prime Minister, other ministers, and some prominent religious leaders were vaccinated after her. 

Tanzania was a beneficiary of the United States COVAX scheme, the global initiative that provides low and middle-income countries with vaccines, and it received over a million Johnson & Johnson shots. 

We lead by example, they say, so it’s not strange for the head of a nation to take the first vaccination. In fact, it’s the standard. But in a nation like Tanzania where its leadership had been an unrepentant anti-vax, this development is a big deal. 

The decision to televise the event is also a crucial first step in reorienting the public opinions of Covid-19 in Tanzania, considering the nationwide denial of the presence of the virus led by Magufuli.

Prior to President Hassan’s bold move to overcome public misconception about the virus, Tanzanians were encouraged to believe that COVID-19 was a facade, or a pick-one-leave-one virus that only infects Godless people.

In the early days of the pandemic, Magufuli downplayed the seriousness of the virus and urged citizens to turn back to God and “pray coronavirus away.” He believed the virus couldn’t manifest in the body of a believer of Jesus Christ.

When vaccines were released and other African countries were raving about acquiring some, he questioned the safety and refused to join in procuring shots for his people, instead he encouraged them to use herbal medicine and steam treatments.

Magufuli held on to this belief until his death in March. Hassan who took the baton from him has a lot to do in changing the mindset of those who’d religiously followed Magufuli’s teaching. 

“There are people who resist vaccination but there are a lot of people waiting for the vaccines,” Hassan said.

It will take time to remove the resistance but publicly airing her vaccination and that of other senior state members is a very brilliant call. It demonstrates the safety of the vaccines to the people and that should make them start coming out in numbers to take the jabs. 

Tanzania qualified to partake in the COVAX scheme since inception, but only joined on 15th of June and didn’t take longer time to secure the vaccination. What can a million shots do in a population of 60 million people? Very little, but the president mentioned that they’ve ordered for more shots and anybody who’s willing to be vaccinated will surely get it. 

Until now, Tanzania, Burundi and Eritrea were the only countries on the continent yet to start vaccinating their citizens against Covid-19. Now, we either nudge the remaining two to quickly join in or we observe them with a close lens.

In African countries, the procurement process for vaccines has typically been the sole responsibility of the government. This announcement raised questions on why and how mPharma were involved.

In a conversation with TechCabal, Gregory Rockson explained its involvement in vaccine procurement and mPharma’s bigger picture for vaccination in Africa.

Rockson first pointed out that the company’s efforts to support the government started in February 2020, at the start of the pandemic.

“We started by looking at how to improve the testing process. About 40% of healthcare delivery takes place in the private healthcare sector so while the testing was being done for free by the government, it was clear the government couldn’t do this alone,” he said.

The $3 million molecular diagnostic fund

To help support the testing process, mPharma established a $3 million molecular diagnostic fund. The purpose of this fund was to invest in private hospitals in Ghana and Nigeria, helping to equip their existing laboratories with necessary molecular diagnostic equipment to test for COVID-19. 

“The biggest gap we saw at the beginning of the pandemic was that our laboratory infrastructure did not have a diagnostic capability. Beyond testing for COVID, most molecular diagnostic work was not happening in Ghana. For example tests like the HPV DNA test and hepatitis viral test only took place in the public sector,” he said. 

mPharma created a risk-sharing agreement where the necessary equipment was given to the companies at no cost and no liability to pay back. In exchange, a revenue split was agreed upon for every test done using the equipment. 

“So if we provided the equipment and the private hospitals made zero revenue, we got nothing. Back then the government was testing everyone for free. In February, in response to the decision we made, people were saying, are we really going to have people pay for the COVID test when the government is doing it for free. Now everyone goes to private labs,” he said.

When the second wave of the pandemic hit, over 60% of all COVID tests done in Ghana were done on the infrastructure that mPharma built in the private hospitals according to Rockson.

He pointed out that before these labs were equipped, the cost of an HPV DNA test for cervical cancer was $80. This was because the samples had to be taken to South Africa for two weeks and the results sent back but today the cost of that test is $30. 

The success of the $3 million molecular diagnostic fund showed that a public-private partnership could work. 

Helping out with Vaccination

While still a bit reluctant to get into another public-private partnership, in November, when it became clear from different reports that the vaccination process was at risk of failing because of the lack of funding, mPharma saw another gap to be filled.

“For example, Ghana would need over $200 million to be able to vaccinate about 70% of its population and that’s just for year one. What happens if COVID becomes endemic? What if every year we need booster shots? What happens with all these new variants that are coming up,” he said.

Those were some of the questions that spurred Rockson and his team to get involved in the vaccination process.

Fortunately for mPharma, many business leaders were uncomfortable waiting for the government. The unexpected outbreak of the coronavirus meant that businesses incurred high costs in their race to keep their employees safe and productive. Some industries were more adversely affected than others; for example, factory workers weren’t able to work in large numbers anymore. And oil rig workers were forced to quarantine for two weeks before they could return to their desks. 

A consortium made up of all banks, telecommunication companies, and some FMCG and oil companies in Ghana decided they would fund the vaccination of their employees.

Beyond paying for only their employees, the consortium also agreed to match the number of employees they vaccinated by giving the same number of free doses to the government.

When the first batch of doses arrived in Ghana, mPharma and the consortium agreed to give all the doses to the government for vaccinating health workers. Putting the public interest before theirs.

The bigger picture

Unlike the molecular fund which brought financial returns for mPharma, Rockson said the vaccination program was done as a contribution to society without any financial gains. He expects that mPharma would be able to build some relationships and credibility with companies and communities through this program.

For mPharma, which has a presence in eight sub-Saharan African countries, Rockson hopes that this framework which has proven to be successful in Ghana would be adopted in other countries to increase financing capacity for more vaccination.

“We need to think of how we can mobilise domestic financing in a period where several countries’ budgets are under severe strain because of the pandemic. If the government uses all its funds to buy COVID vaccines, what are they going to use to improve the education sector or to build roads?” 

“We need to remember that ‘free’ is not a strategy,” he added.
While 45 African countries have received vaccines and 43 have started the vaccination process,  less than 2% of Africans have been vaccinated. Compared to over 60% in other major economies, it shows that there’s still more ground to be covered. The framework mPharma has introduced might be the missing link in accelerating vaccination in Africa.

Following this development, the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) launched an online portal and announced the guidelines for registrations.

How to register

Registration requires a device with a working internet connection. Nigerians who want to register can visit the NPHCDA’s registration portal.

What do you need to fill the form?

To fill the vaccination form, you need your basic information: full name, phone number, email address, date of birth, sex, a form of ID, a residential address including states, LGA of residence, and ward of residence. 

You are also meant to select your preferred vaccination date and time slot and upload a photograph. The form asks if you work in the health sector and if you have any medical conditions or allergies. 

Finally, you are required to type in a code and this completes your registration process. 

You should receive a message that your registration has been completed. You will also be issued a vaccination ID. The message goes thus: 

“Registration Completed!  Your Vaccination ID is:

Your data is successfully received.

Thank you for taking the time to fill the form, you will receive an SMS and email shortly containing your Vaccination No. and other instructions.”

Who is eligible to receive the vaccination?

Healthcare workers top the list of people who will receive the vaccine first. Away from them, the NPHCDA said it will prioritise “frontline workers – the military, police, oil and gas workers, customs workers, and strategic leaders.”

Nigeria will be the third African country to receive a vaccine under the COVAX scheme, after Ghana and Ivory Coast. It should be noted that the vaccine will be administered without charges and the country is expected to receive a total of 16million free doses from COVAX in the coming months.

A group of prominent Nigerians came together under an umbrella they called Coalition Against COVID (CA-COVID). 

With members like Jim Ovia, Aliko Dangote, Tony Elumelu, amongst others, the coalition promised in January to put out nearly $100 million to buy some portion of the COVAX AstraZeneca vaccine allocated to Nigeria. This came after they contributed over ₦30 billion to the fight against the coronavirus.

That intervention plan for CA-COVID to purchase vaccines for Nigerians now seems to be shelved, as the Finance Minister, Zainab Ahmed said the federal government will now draw up a supplementary budget in March to cover for COVID-19 vaccinations.

Nigeria is expected to receive almost 4 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine today, a fraction of the 16 million doses to be delivered in batches over the next months by the COVAX facility. The COVAX facility manages vaccine storage and financing for poor and middle-income countries co-led by Gavi, The Vaccine Alliance, UNICEF, and the World Health Organisation.

In the politics of global health, wealthy countries get priority shares of vaccines, these are the countries that readily have the money to pay the innovating pharmaceutical company the worth of their investment. 

Poorer countries, often developing or under-developed countries get allocations fixed with their regional authorities to be released to them when an agreed sum is paid. 42 million doses of the COVAX AstraZeneca vaccine have been allocated to Nigeria by the African Union, the regional body tasked with rationing 670 million doses to its member states.

The vaccine delivery expected Tuesday is the first tranche of a possible nine and places the country as the third African country to receive delivery of vaccines, behind Ghana and Ivory Coast.

Nigeria, a country of about 200 million people, plans to vaccinate 70% of its people. This estimated population should be enough to achieve herd immunity in the country. 

40% will be vaccinated in 2021, and another 30% in the coming year. Nigeria, in the planning, expects about 25% of the vaccines to be donations. 

The Nigerian Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) maintains that the priority population for the first tranche of the vaccine will be people in these categories: healthcare workers, frontline workers, police, customs, military, oil and gas workers, and strategic leaders. 

Yesterday, via its Twitter handle, NPHCDA released an Electronic Management of Immunisation Data (EMID) link for people interested in getting the COVID vaccine to be captured and scheduled for vaccination.

At this point, Nigeria looks to be in a better place with regards to COVID vaccinations than it was a few months ago when no planning was made and only rumours of inoculating with the locally made variant endured. 

Although a supplementary budget this early into the year begs many questions about the country’s finance, it’s probably something to be dealt with later.