UAB Hospital Receives First Delivery Of Pfizer’s COVID-19 Vaccine, Vaccinations Begin Thursday
UAB Hospital received its first shipment of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine Tuesday morning.
The hospital was given 10,725 doses out of the entire state’s total doses of 40,950.
“It was astronomically more vaccine than we anticipated receiving,” says Dr. Sarah Nafziger, co-chair of UAB’s Emergency Management Committee. It’s “a very complex undertaking to get this up and running in 12 days.”
UAB will administer the vaccine to 7,507 hospital-based personnel, 1,609 clinical based personnel including ambulatory personnel, and 1,609 emergency medical services personnel in a seven-county region within a 40-mile radius of UAB.
The vaccinations will be by appointment only and will begin on Thursday, December 17.
“The reason we’re not rushing to administer the vaccine today is there’s a lot of logistics involved in making appointments for and administering [the] vaccine,” said Nafziger.
She said the goal is to administer the vaccine safely and correctly. “So we’re going to get everybody vaccinated. We’re going to get all these doses delivered, but we’re not going to rush it. We’d rather do it correctly than rush it and make a mistake on the front end.”
UAB will work six days a week to administer the vaccine “in a timely manner,” said Nafziger.
“This vaccine has given us a ray of hope … While we’re excited to receive these vaccine doses, these are not going to save us from the surge we’re in right now,” said Nafziger. “These vaccines are going to help us with future surges, but for now, I don’t want everyone to hear ‘oh we have a vaccine, we can go ahead and stop wearing our mask … because that’s just simply not the case right now.”
She said UAB Hospital healthcare workers, employees and staff will still be required to social distance and wear a mask.
When Will The General Public Get A Vaccine?
Nafziger said they don’t know for sure.
“The best information that I’m hearing, which, of course, is speculation, is in hopefully the spring, ” said Nafziger. “But we just don’t know the exact timeline for that.”
Editor’s Note: UAB holds WBHM’s broadcast license, but our news and business departments operate independently.
Florida’s 6-week abortion ban will have a ‘snowball effect’ on residents across the South
Abortion rights advocates say the ban will likely force many to travel farther for abortion care and endure pregnancy and childbirth against their will.
Attitudes among Alabama lawmakers softening on Medicaid expansion
Alabama is one of ten states which has not expanded Medicaid. Republican leaders have pushed back against the idea for years.
Birmingham is 3rd worst in the Southeast for ozone pollution, new report says
The American Lung Association's "State of the Air" report shows some metro areas in the Gulf States continue to have poor air quality.
Why haven’t Kansas and Alabama — among other holdouts — expanded access to Medicaid?
Only 10 states have not joined the federal program that expands Medicaid to people who are still in the "coverage gap" for health care
Once praised, settlement to help sickened BP oil spill workers leaves most with nearly nothing
Thousands of ordinary people who helped clean up after the 2010 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico say they got sick. A court settlement was supposed to help compensate them, but it hasn’t turned out as expected.
Q&A: How harm reduction can help mitigate the opioid crisis
Maia Szalavitz discusses harm reduction's effectiveness against drug addiction, how punitive policies can hurt people who need pain medication and more.
