A New York health worker on Monday became the first person to be vaccinated against covid-19 in a public ceremony in the United States, the country in the world that has suffered the most deaths from the pandemic.
“The first vaccine was administered. Congratulations United States! Congratulations to the whole WORLD!” Celebrated the outgoing president of the United States, Republican Donald Trump.
Sandra Lindsay, a nurse in an intensive care unit at Long Island Jewish Hospital, received the injection at 9:30 am (2:30 pm GMT) in a live televised ceremony.
The vaccine is to be administered first in the country to a priority population group: healthcare workers and residents of nursing homes.
Lindsay described the experience like any other vaccine.
“I feel good and I feel relieved,” she said. “I hope this marks the beginning of the end of a very painful period in the history of our country.
The nurse wanted to emphasize to the public opinion that the vaccine is “safe.”
“We are in a pandemic so we all have to do our part,” he added.
The administration of the vaccine comes at a time when cases are rising in the United States, when the country has already accumulated 299,000 deaths.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who attended the ceremony virtually, told Lindsay that he hoped the vaccine would give her and other workers a sense of “safety.”
“The process for the vaccine to reach a critical mass will take months. So, this is the light at the end of the tunnel, but it is a long tunnel,” said the governor, who reiterated the message that the population must continue to respect social distancing measures.
Batches of the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine left the company’s Michigan plant Sunday.
The doses were sent in boxes with dry ice (dry ice), which will keep them at -70 ºC, the temperature necessary to preserve the compound.
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