By KAYODE OYERO

The General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God, Pastor Enoch Adeboye, has explained that he will receive COVID-19 vaccine for the sake of the gospel.

He stated this on Friday night during the monthly Holy Ghost Service programme of the church at the Redemption Camp along the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.

The 79-year-old preacher said God’s mercies have kept Nigerians all along, noting that only those whose time to die had come died.

Addressing thousands of his members, Adeboye said, “I have never said to you, ‘Don’t be vaccinated.’ You’ve never heard that from me. Rather than live in fear or doubt, get vaccinated. If you believe that getting vaccinated will put your mind at rest, then go ahead.

“Daddy, are you saying that you too could be vaccinated? If there are nations in the world that say that I cannot come to preach the gospel there because of vaccination, I will do anything for Jesus Christ.

“If vaccination or no vaccination is going to hinder me from doing the work God has called me to do, even if they ask me to be vaccinated 100 times, I will be vaccinated.

“So, don’t ever say that you heard from me that I said that you should not be vaccinated.”

Adeboye, however, described as laughable, the move by some governors who made COVID-19 vaccination compulsory before people could attend church gatherings.

He noted that such leaders were missing the point, saying that the number of vaccine jabs available in the country was not enough to go round.

With the detection of the deadly Delta variant globally, some countries have made COVID-19 vaccination a compulsory immigration item.

Nigeria has so far recorded over 200,000 cases of COVID-19 and more than 2,700 associated deaths since the index case of the virus was reported in the country in March 2020, according to statistics by Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.

With the number of cases and fatalities on the rise, the NCDC continues to urge Nigerians to maintain social distancing and hygiene practices as well as use masks in public to prevent transmission of the lethal virus which has been identified to move through droplets.

The Federal Government through the National Primary Health Care Development Agency has since been encouraging Nigerians to take COVID-19 vaccines in order for the country to achieve herd immunity.

About five million Nigerians have since received their first shots of COVID-19 vaccination while about two million have completed their second doses, according to NPHCDA statistics as of end of September.

The government also encourages religious and political leaders to take the vaccine to dissipate vaccine hesitancy among the populace.

However, the Presiding Bishop of the Living Faith Church Worldwide aka Winners’ Chapel, David Oyedepo, said that he won’t take the COVID-19 vaccine jab, adding that he is not a guinea pig. (Saturday PUNCH)

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