Historic US coronavirus vaccine campaign kicks off with convoy of trucks
- 13 Dec 2020
Gulf Today Report
The first trucks loaded with suitcase-sized containers of coronavirus vaccine for widespread use in the United States will leave Pfizer Inc's manufacturing facility in Kalamazoo, Michigan, on Sunday morning.
The Pfizer's dry-ice cooled packages can hold as many as 4,875 shots, those are critical to stopping the nation's coronavirus outbreak destined to reach states a day later. The first leg of their journey will be from Kalamazoo to planes positioned nearby.
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Workers will load the vaccine — which must be kept at sub-Arctic temperatures — onto the aircraft that will shuttle them to United Parcel Service or FedEx air cargo hubs in Louisville, Kentucky, and Memphis, Tennessee, respectively.
A woman arrives by ambulance to Wyckoff Hospital in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn in New York. AFP
Shipments of the Pfizer vaccine will set in motion the biggest vaccination effort in American history at a critical juncture of the pandemic that has killed 1.6 million and sickened 71 million worldwide.
"We have spent months strategizing with Operation Warp Speed officials and our healthcare customers on efficient vaccine logistics, and the time has arrived to put the plan into action," Wes Wheeler, president of UPS Healthcare, said on Saturday.
Familiar UPS and FedEx package delivery drivers, who may also be carrying holiday gifts and other parcels, will deliver many of the "suitcases" into the hands of healthcare providers on Monday. The shipments are the first of three expected this week.
Lill Bina Hong has his tests taken at the International Community Health Services in Seattle, Washington. AFP
Healthcare workers and elderly residents of long-term care homes are first in line to receive the inoculations.
Initially, about 3 million doses were expected to be sent out, and the priority is health care workers and nursing home residents as infections, hospitalizations and deaths soar in the US With numbers likely to get worse over the holidays, the vaccine is offering a bright spot in the fight against the pandemic that's killed nearly 300,000 Americans.