New York nurse among first Americans to get vaccinated against COVID-19 in non-trial setting
Sandra Lindsay, an ICU nurse at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in Queens, New York, was among the first Americans to get vaccinated against COVID-19 in a non-trial setting on Monday morning.
“This is what heroes look like,” said Governor Andrew Cuomo, adding in his tweet, “HISTORY. The first New Yorker, frontline nurse Sandra Lindsay, has been vaccinated. Healing is coming.”
Shortly before 9:30 a.m. local time, Northwell Health Director of Employee Health Services Michelle Chester administered the vaccine to Lindsay, a front-line health care worker eligible to receive the vaccine under Phase 1 of New York’s Vaccine Distribution Plan, according to an official release issued on Monday.
The vaccine was developed by Pfizer, a New York-based company, and authorized by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and New York’s Clinical Advisory Task Force late last week, it added.
TRUST SCIENCE
“We trust science here in New York. The federal government approved the vaccine. We then had a separate panel that also approved the vaccine and we’ve been following the science all along. I hope this gives you, and the healthcare workers who are battling this every day, a sense of security and safety and a little more confidence in doing your job once the second vaccine has been administered,”
the governor was quoted as saying.
“In New York we prioritized healthcare workers at the top of the list to receive the vaccine, because we know that you are out there every day putting your lives in danger for the rest of us, so we want to make sure we’re doing everything we can to keep you safe. And the point about New Yorkers and Americans having to do their part and take the vaccine, because the vaccine only works if the American people take it,” he added.
While in a video link with the governor, Lindsay said, “I feel I hope today, relieved. I feel like healing is coming and 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. We’re in a pandemic and so we all need to do your part to put an end to the pandemic, and to not give up so soon.”
“There is light at the end of the tunnel, but we still need to continue to wear our masks, to social distance. I believe in science. As a nurse, my practice is guided by science and so I trust that. What I don’t trust is that, if I contract COVID, I don’t know how it would impact or those who I come in contact with, so I encourage everyone to take the vaccine,”
she added.
DEATHS AND CASES SPIKE
New York state would receive around 170,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine within the first week of distribution as the United States on Sunday started shipment of the first batch of 2.9 million doses of vaccines to distribution centers across the United States.
The FDA on Friday nodded the emergency use of the COVID-19 vaccine jointly developed by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech.
By the end of this week, 2.9 million doses of the vaccine would be delivered to 636 locations across the country, according to Pfizer.
As of Monday morning, the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University reported 35,557 coronavirus deaths in New York state, the worst in the country.
Nationwide, total deaths are expected to top 300,000 soon and confirmed cases have surpassed 16 million, both the highest in the world.
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Source: NEW YORK, Xinhua