On Monday health workers became the first Californians to receive the initial dose of Pfizer’s corona virus vaccine outside of clinical trials, providing hope and relief in one of the darkest periods of the epidemic.
Kim Taylor, an emergency room nurse at the Kaiser Permanent Medical Center in Los Angeles, is the first in the state to receive the promising vaccine, as it is expected to be a scary campaign to vaccinate 40 million California residents over the next several months.
“For the past nine months we have been leading the clock around leading workers, wanting to know what we are doing and caring for our patients,” Taylor received applause and news cameras as he watched his first dose of praise as government Gavin Newsom watched. “What you want to know is that help is coming. Today is the first step.”
California’s first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine touched down at Los Angeles International Airport Sunday evening, and within hours the drugs were distributed to district health departments and hospitals across the state. The first Californians to be vaccinated by vaccination joined people across the country on Monday in launching a mass vaccination campaign in the United States. Sandra Lindsay, director of complex care nursing at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New York, received the country’s first shot at a morning media event.
These vaccines mark a key moment in the war against the corona virus epidemic that has killed more than 300,000 Americans and devastated the economy.
Health workers at the Contra Costa Regional Medical Center and Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, who received the 2,000 dose on Monday, will receive their footage as the Bay Area participates in that milestone on Tuesday morning.
“San Francisco will prioritize our first health care workers and begin administering the COVID-19 vaccine tomorrow morning,” San Francisco Mayor London Breit tweeted Monday afternoon. “After almost nine months in line for our first shelter, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.”
In addition to essential health care workers, California’s initial allocation will go to approximately 327,000 sizes of highly vulnerable patients in long-term care facilities. It is not possible for the general population to start getting vaccinated until late spring or summer.
About 33,150 vaccines were delivered Monday to four hospital systems in California – Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Eureka, Kaiser Permanent in Los Angeles and San Diego County Psychiatric Hospital and Distribution Hospital in San Diego County. An additional 24 health systems were expected to receive their doses on Tuesday, Newsom reported.
“Today is hopeful, we are optimistic, but we will also take note of where we really are in these epidemics,” the governor said during a news conference outside the hospital in Hollywood. “… today we received multiple quantities because there were new cases all over the state of California.”
Early vaccine levels have come as California’s explosive COVID-19 outbreak continues to wreak havoc on communities and hospitals. More than 222,000 new cases in the past week – an average of more than 31,700 a day – have been tested positively by more Californians in the last seven days than in October and September.
As of Monday, more than 39,000 cases had been reported in a single day, according to data compiled by the news organization.
In the past two weeks, the average daily number of cases in California has increased by 127%, and hospitals have increased by 76% in COVID-positive patients.
While the San Francisco General was receiving its vaccine dose on Monday, other hospitals were eagerly awaiting its arrival this weekend.
Santa Clara County, which has about 70,000 health workers, is expected to receive 17,550 – more Pfizer vaccine levels this week than any Bay Area district starting this week.
The county announced Monday that it is changing its isolated list of people vulnerable to the virus, in line with new guidelines from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Those who have traveled outside the district or have been a recent victim are advised to isolate for 10 days instead of 14 if they do not show symptoms.
In the remaining Bay Area, agents expect San Diego County to have levels of about 5,850 on Tuesday, Contra Costa about 10,000, Alameda County 12,675, Marine County 1,950 and Berkeley City 975, an independent local health agency.
“We are on the brink of a historic moment for our city and our nation,” San Francisco Health Director Dr Grant Colbox said Monday. But he warned that vaccination rolls for this uprising would be long and delayed, and that in the current epidemic rate, hospitals in San Francisco would fill up in three to four weeks.
“I can’t stress this enough, we have to be vigilant,” he said. “… This vaccine will not save us from being hospitalized right now.”
Kaiser Permanent expects the first dose of vaccine to be delivered to its Northern California medical centers starting Wednesday and Thursday.
At the Regional Medical Center in East San Jose – the most affected hospital in the Bay Area – extensive programs are underway to determine the line of recipients among physicians, nurses and staff. Hospital administrators also plan on the impact of certain vaccine side effects, including the flu and cold, symptoms that may keep some staff at home for a day or two.
“It’s an extensive process, this person gets it first, this person gets it second. Is this the ER, ICU?” Said regional spokeswoman Sarah Sherwood. “We passed everyone in the hospital and you want a shot? Nine out of 10 people say yes. ”
At the same time, the number of COVID patients seeking medical help is increasing. Last week, the hospital, which serves a densely populated area of Latin and Asian residents, was attacked by 70 new patients, mostly essential workers and those at high risk of contracting the virus, and the ICU was packed.
For those who think the advent of the vaccine is a reason to abandon public health guidelines such as wearing a mask and social distance, John Swartzberg, a professor of infectious diseases and vaccines at the University of California at Berkeley, has a message: “Vaccines do not protect people. Vaccines do. “It will be a while until enough people are vaccinated to put an end to the epidemic.
“This vaccine will make a difference to those who receive it – that is, once they get the second dose – but it’s not going to make a difference to the general population and the horrible (corona virus) numbers we see for a good person.
“A lot of people will die to get it.”