Ndubuisi Francis in Abuja The federal government is committed to procuring 29.588 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine through the AVAT initiative, coordinated by Afreximbank, the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed, has said. Speaking at a Collaborative Africa Budget Reform Initiative (CABRI) General Assembly webinar, she said the supplementary budget for COVID-19 vaccines would cover the cost of additional vaccines over and above those provided by COVAX, as well as the full cost of operations and logistics for delivering the vaccines around the country. She stated: “Already, the sum of N29.1 billion has been released from the Routine Immunisation budgetary provision (Service Wide Vote) to the National Primary Healthcare Development Agency (NPHCDA) as an advance for the operational cost of deployment of the COVID-19 vaccines.