Ban on my HIV/AIDS Vaccine is a huge economic loss to the nation - Dr. Abalaka

            
After a decade of retreat from media and global attention over his hyped anti-HIV vaccine, Nigerian doctor, Jeremiah Abalaka, resurfaced at the weekend, saying the ban on his vaccine by the Federal Government was a huge economic loss to the nation.
At a press briefing in Abuja, the owner of Medicrest Specialist Hospital in Gwagwalada Area Council of the nation’s capital said had the Federal Government worked with him, the vaccine would have yielded more economic dividend to the country than crude oil.

Abalaka said he was convinced God wanted to use his knowledge as alternative to crude oil for Nigeria, but the government failed to accept his effort.
He listed the benefits of the vaccine over crude as “no environmental degradation or pollution; no pipeline bunkering; no theft on the high seas; no involvement of refineries that are still yearning to be put into operation; no fuel subsidies and their scandals; immunity from the fluctuations of international oil price, among others.”
He, however, praised Justice Binta Nyako of the Federal High Court in Markudi, Benue State, who ruled in his favour after a long litigation. He had approached the court to stop the execution of the ban.

Abalaka told journalists, who grilled him during the conference that though he was becoming older he would continue to promote the vaccine by imparting his knowledge to younger doctors.
Justice Nyako had also ruled that though the Federal Government has the right to safeguard the lives of its citizens, but “the ban on the use of the plaintiff’s vaccine is illegal, null and void, but its use must be at the discretion of the patient.”
Justice Binta added: “All the exhibits tendered by the plaintiffs show that what he has discovered is very interesting and that a responsible agency should have bought into it for further tests and investigation…(yet) the plaintiff’s research and efforts were nipped in the bud.”

The court also ruled that the Federal Government lacked basic facilities it could use for the required test on the plaintiff’s work, and should work with him on the need to further research on his vaccine. But the doctor said no response had come from the government after the ruling.
Citing the experiences of Ebola Virus Disease, which has killed over 8,000 people in West Africa, and which has attracted hurriedly-produced vaccines worldwide, Abalaka said he did nothing wrong by not following the “long procedures required by the National Agency for Food, Drug 

Administration and Control, NAFDAC, at the time to test his work.
He blamed the Federal Government under former president Olusegun Obasanjo, which through the then Minister of Health, Dr. Tim Menakaya, announced suspension of the vaccine because it failed to undergo proper medical procedures as laid down by the World Health Organisation, WHO, and NAFDAC.

He also argued that the Federal Government was only protecting the interest of the Western world at the time, which was calling for antiretroviral drugs; and that the world has since failed to achieve any breakthrough over the disease.
Besides, he claimed that only drugs could undergo clinical experimentations as demanded by the government, and not vaccine. His words: “Anything you use that is of animal origin for the treatment of disease, that is, of vegetable origin or mineral origin, NAFDAC handles it.

“That is not your definition as a layman of drug. For me, as a layman, a drug is anything. If you have lost a lot of water and you come to hospital, we give you water… When you have people who need blood to be given to them in the hospital, a person who has an accident and is bleeding so much, or during operation or lady in labour is bleeding so much, we give them blood, that blood is never taken to NAFDAC for registration. Have you ever heard of it?
“How do you register the blood we use in hospital with NAFDAC? If I am to take this man’s blood and give to another who is sick, do I carry him to NAFDAC? Or do I take his blood to NAFDAC and apply for registration.
source:nationalmirror