An intensive care unit nurse became the first person in the United States to receive the newly authorized Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine on Monday, calling it a sign that “healing is coming” as the U.S. coronavirus death toll approaches 300,000.
Sandra Lindsay, who has treated some of the sickest COVID-19 patients for months, was given the vaccine at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in the New York City borough of Queens, an early epicenter of the country’s COVID-19 outbreak, receiving applause on a livestream with New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.
“It didn’t feel any different from taking any other vaccine,” Lindsay said. “I feel hopeful today, relieved. I feel like healing is coming. I hope this marks the beginning of the end of a very painful time in our history. I want to instill public confidence that the vaccine is safe.”
Cuomo tweeted a picture of Lindsay, wearing a mask and staring resolutely ahead, as a doctor injected her in the arm, and said she was the first American to get vaccinated.
“This is what heroes look like,” Cuomo wrote.
Minutes after Lindsay received the injection, President Donald Trump sent a tweet: “First Vaccine Administered. Congratulations USA! Congratulations WORLD!”
Northwell Health, New York state’s largest health system, operates some of the select hospitals in the United States that were administering the country’s first inoculations of the a COVID-19 vaccine outside of clinical trials on Monday.
The vaccine, developed by Pfizer Inc and German partner BioNTech SE, won an emergency use authorization from federal regulators on Friday after it was found to be 95% effective in preventing illness in a large clinical trial.
The first 2.9 million doses began to be shipped to distribution centers around the country on Sunday, just 11 months after the United States documented its first case of COVID-19.
As of Monday, the United States had registered more than 16 million COVID-19 cases and was fast closing in on the grim milestone of 300,000 deaths from the virus.
“It’s been an incredible morning. It’s historic,” said Dr. Leonardo Seoane, speaking over a livestream video on Monday after becoming one of the first Louisiana resident to receive the vaccine at Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans, where he led some of the clinical trials for the Pfizer shot.
LOGISTICAL CHALLENGE
The first U.S. shipments of coronavirus vaccine departed from Pfizer’s facility in Kalamazoo, Michigan, on Sunday, packed into trucks with dry-ice to maintain the necessary minus 70 Celsius (-94 Fahrenheit) temperature. They were transported to UPS and FedEx planes waiting at air fields in Lansing and Grand Rapids, kicking off a national immunization endeavor of unprecedented complexity.
The jets delivered the shipments to UPS and FedEx cargo hubs in Louisville and Memphis, from where they were loaded onto planes and trucks to be distributed to the first 145 of 636 vaccine-staging areas across the country. Second and third waves of vaccine shipments were due to go out to the remaining sites on Tuesday and Wednesday.
“This is the most difficult vaccine rollout in history,” U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams told Fox News on Monday.
“There will be hiccups undoubtedly, but we’ve done everything from a federal level and working with partners to make it go as smoothly as possible. Please be patient with us,” Adams said, adding that he would get the shot as soon as he could.
MORE DOSES ON THE WAY
Healthcare workers and elderly residents of long-term care homes will be first in line to get the inoculations of a two-dose regimen given three weeks apart. Next will be essential workers, as determined by the U.S. states, and elderly people with underlying health conditions.
U.S. top infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci told MSNBC on Monday that Americans with no heightened risk factors could expect to get vaccinated “by the end of March, the beginning of April.”
“By the end of the second quarter of 2021, maybe by the end of late spring …so that by the time we get into the fall, we can start approaching some degree of relief,” Fauci said.
Health officials have warned that masks and social distancing will still be needed for months to control the currently rampaging outbreak. U.S. Operation Warp Speed top adviser Moncef Slaoui said the United States hopes to have about 40 million vaccine doses – enough for 20 million people – distributed by the end of this month. That would include vaccines from both Pfizer and Moderna Inc. An outside U.S. Food and Drug Administration advisory panel is scheduled to consider the Moderna vaccine on Thursday, with emergency use expected to be granted shortly after. On Friday, Moderna announced it had struck a deal with the U.S. government to deliver 100 million additional doses in the second quarter.
Pfizer Chief Executive Albert Bourla told CNN on Monday that the company plans on producing 1.3 billion doses next year and is working to increase that number to meet high demand, including a request by the U.S. government for 100 million more doses by the second quarter of 2021 still being negotiated. That is in addition to the 100 million expected by the end of the first quarter.
(Reporting by Jonathan Allen, Gabriella Borter, Lisa Lambert, Lisa Baertlein, Nandita Bose and Brendan O’Brien; Editing by Angus MacSwan, Paul Simao and Bill Berkrot)