"I was like, 'Please, let me go first! I’m so excited,'" said Nicole Chang, RN, who works in the COVID-19 unit at UCLA Health Santa Monica Medical Center. "It's just been a really long year for everybody and I think this is an opportunity for us to heal together and finally get back on track to normalcy. I miss seeing people smile! I miss seeing people's faces. I miss hugging my grandma. Those are all motivating factors as to why I want to get this vaccine."
Chang, who was second in line for the vaccine, said she barely felt a thing during the injection: "It felt like nothing. I didn't even feel a pinch!" Besides, she said, "A pinch is nothing compared to what these people go through (with COVID-19). I’ve seen the devastation it causes."
The vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech — the first to receive emergency use authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration — is part of a nationwide immunization effort that many hope represents the beginning of the end of a global pandemic that has caused widespread illness, death, economic strife and social upheaval.
The vaccine requires two doses, given 21 days apart for full efficacy.
A second vaccine, from drugmaker Moderna, is expected to receive emergency use authorization from the FDA in the coming days. It also requires two doses. Several other vaccine candidates are undergoing clinical trials in the US.
The novel coronavirus known as SARS-CoV-2 has killed more than 1.6 million people worldwide, including more than 300,000 in the United States and 21,200 in California.
A cure for the virus has yet to be discovered, though multiple treatment trials are underway.
One antiviral drug, remdesivir, has been approved by the FDA to treat hospitalized patients and two other therapies – monoclonal antibodies from drug companies Eli Lilly and Regeneron – have received emergency use authorization for outpatient COVID-19 cases.
The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines use technology that has never been employed in vaccines before. Rather than relying on inactivated or weakened virus strains, as many common vaccines do, these use messenger RNA (mRNA) technology, which tells cells to produce a protein that stimulates an immune response to COVID-19 without exposure to the disease.
Eunice Lee, RN, BSN, administered the first shots to UCLA Health staff on Wednesday — a break from her work in the intensive care unit with COVID-19 patients.
"I'm a little nervous," she said before administering the first injection to Dr. Briggs-Malonson. "But very honored. It's very hopeful and I'm so thankful.
