Road to achieving COVID-19 herd immunity in Niger Republic: Challenges and recommendations.

Abstract

COVID-19 pandemic has had tremendous impact on countries across the world and Niger Republic is not left out of the ravaging impact of the virus. The rapid dissemination of the virus across the globe has led to the development of safe and efficacious vaccines at an unprecedented level. While Niger Republic has prioritized COVID-19 vaccination in line with the global plan to attain herd immunity by vaccinating 70% of world's population, the country has continued to struggle to expand coverage of its population. Niger Republic is faced with challenges such as conflict, COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy, poor COVID-19 vaccine demand and inefficient information system, consequently leading to low COVID-19 vaccine demand and uptake. These challenges coupled with the different wave of the pandemic, the latest largely driven by the Omicron variant has slowed down progress towards achieving herd immunity in Niger Republic. There is need for the Nigerien government to scale up vaccination drive as well as implement refined approaches towards achieving the country's herd immunity target. This paper aimed to discuss the current state of COVID-19 vaccination including efforts and challenges towards achieving herd immunity in Niger Republic, thus informing strategies to ramp up COVID-19 vaccination in the country.