The Lagos State Government said it is carrying out a post-mortem examination on the bodies of nine-month-old identical twins who died 24 hours after receiving routine immunisation in a primary healthcare centre.
It added that the findings will be made public once available.
The Permanent Secretary of the Lagos State Primary Health Care Board, Ibrahim Mustafa, disclosed this in an interview with PREMIUM TIMES on Saturday.
Mr Mustafa noted that investigations into the incident began immediately after it was reported, even before the matter gained widespread public attention.
“At the time this thing happened, the Lagos State Government started the investigation. This was even after Christmas,” he said.
The twins reportedly died a day after they were vaccinated at a primary healthcare centre in the Ajangbadi area of Ojo Local Government Area.
He said there was, so far, no evidence to show that the vaccines administered to the children caused their deaths.
“We give vaccines all the time. We’ve been giving vaccines from time immemorial. Yes, the children got vaccinated,” he said.
“It wasn’t, we don’t think, that the vaccine caused whatever. But at the same time, we seriously empathise with the parents, and we sympathise with them. Losing children is not something anybody wants.”
He added that the state government ordered a post-mortem to determine the actual cause of death and involved the police as part of the investigation process.
Autopsy, toxicology tests underway
According to him, the post-mortem examination has already been conducted, and the state is currently awaiting the results, which he said should be ready in the coming week.
“The only thing that can show what caused this thing is the post-mortem. That post-mortem has been ordered. The police are also involved,” he said.
He added that toxicology tests were also being carried out to following the allegations raised by the children’s father.
“Not just the post-mortem, we’re also doing the toxicology, which will further elucidate what has happened based on the allegations of the father,” he said.
While the toxicology analysis may require samples to be sent outside the country, he said, efforts were being made to complete the process without undue delay.
He also added that the specific vaccines administered to the twins, as well as the timing of the immunisation, would be detailed in the final post-mortem report.
He assured that the Lagos State Government would make the findings public once the investigations were concluded.
The death
The death of the nine-month-old twins attracted public attention after the twins’ father, Promise Samuel, took to his TikTok page to allege that his children died following routine immunisation administered at a government health facility.
In the video shared online, the father claimed that his twins fell ill shortly after receiving vaccines and died the next day, and at the same time, after showing signs of extreme weakness.
Mr Samuel said he took the twins for routine immunisation on the morning of 24 December 2025, adding that they became extremely weak immediately after the injections.
“They could not eat, they could not play, they could not even disturb as they used to. They were just weak.”
He noted that a nurse at the health centre advised that the children be given paracetamol if their temperature rose, adding that he and his wife gave the drug and also bathed the children in cold water, but their condition did not improve.
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“My wife bathed them in cold water. They died on the 25th. The two of them died at the same time. The drug weakened them to the extent that they couldn’t talk, they couldn’t eat, they couldn’t play as usual,” he said.
His posts sparked public reactions, with many Nigerians questioning vaccine safety and the handling of immunisation programmes, prompting official responses from the state government and renewed assurances on routine vaccination protocols.
Millions of Nigerian children are vaccinated annually. Some of the popular vaccines that children receive include those of polio, chicken pox and measles.
