Category: Covid-19 Vaccine

FLINT, MI -- Nurse Patrick Bryant was the first McLaren Flint worker to receive the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine.

After treating many sick people in the COVID-19 unit and watching the virus spike twice, Bryant said the vaccine is the only way to beat the virus.

Im starting to see hope, he said, minutes after receiving his first shot Thursday, Dec. 17 in the Ballenger Auditorium at the hospital.

Medical workers at McLaren Flint were some of the first in the city to receive the vaccine.

Five medical workers stationed in the hospitals COVID-19 unit were vaccinated at a media event Thursday morning.

Among the group were two registered nurses, a nurse anesthetist, respiratory therapist and a physician.

Bryant will get the second dose of the vaccine on Jan. 6.

He lived in a mobile home for more than a month as he worked through the first COVID-19 spike from mid-March through April.

I parked it behind the McLaren Hospitality House for about a month and a half and worked almost every single day, he said. I was on almost every COVID floor running codes and taking bodies to the morgue. Ive seen a lot of that. It took a toll on us.

He said he lived away from home to protect his family.

Now, Michigan is in the midst of a second spike. From Dec. 6 to Jan. 7, Bryant said he has only had two days off.

A lot of nurses are getting sick and I feel like I should be here to pick up the slack, he said.

Bryant has three daughters, ages 16, 20 and 21. His oldest daughter will graduate from nursing school in the spring. His mother retired from nursing this year.

He said he is proud to be part of a family of nurses.

We didnt sign up for this but Im just glad I could be there to help, he said. It gives a whole new meaning to nursing.

People who are wary of the vaccine should go out and research what scientists and medical workers have to say about it, Bryant said.

Physician Ravinder Singala was the fifth medical worker to receive the vaccine.

I hope other employees and other people will follow in my footsteps and get the vaccination to reduce the number of cases so the pandemic can end, Singala said.

In his 11 years as a physician, Singala said he never imagined a year like 2020.

Its actually been very horrifying to see these patients go through the hospital with some of them surviving and some of them, unfortunately, not surviving, he said.

The vaccination is needed to end the pandemic, Singala said, whos worked at McLaren Flint for nine of those years.

He added those who are hesitant to receive the vaccine should do more research.

Follow the science, read the information, dont be judgmental and stop following conspiracy theories, Singala said. When you listen to a friend or a family member who says Dont get it. Its a conspiracy. Or We dont know what the long term affects are. Remind them there is a whole group who has already taken the vaccination trial series and done wonderful.

Singalas family has also had multiple generations work in a variety of medical fields. His wife had to leave her job as a nurse practitioner to be with their 8- and 9-year-old children through the pandemic.

Hopefully with the vaccination we can get the kids back to school, people back to work and return our community back to normal, he said.

Lana Mesack was the first nurse to administer the COVID-19 vaccine at McLaren Flint.

Its very exciting, she said. Were all very hopeful that this will change the way we have to live right now, give us a little more freedom and help our staff safe -- our frontline providers -- keep them from getting this virus.

Workers on the COVID-19 floor are the first to get the vaccine.

Mesack is in nursing education and will receive the vaccine after the COVID-19 floor workers have been vaccinated.

Hopefully this vaccine will mean that our front line staff are protected and they dont have to expose themselves or their family members, she said. Hopefully we can start seeing our families. A lot of our nursing staff have isolated themselves from their immediate family members to protect them. This gives hope that maybe soon theyll be able to spend some time with family and that the patients were seeing here will decrease and we can have a little more normalcy in our lives.

Read more:

Michigan reports 4,024 new coronavirus cases, 190 new deaths

Covenant HealthCare staff roll up sleeves for first round of COVID-19 vaccine in Saginaw

More than 500 Memorial Healthcare hospital employees volunteer to receive Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine

Live COVID-19 vaccination to include Michigans Dr. Joneigh Khaldun

Read the original:

COVID-19 vaccine is the only way to beat it, says first McLaren Flint nurse to receive shot - MLive.com

Vice President Mike Pence and second lady Karen Pence will be vaccinated publicly on Friday, the vice president's office confirmed. The vice president will be the most high-profile person yet to publicly receive the coronavirus vaccine.

President Trump, who had COVID-19 in October, has not yet committed to taking the vaccine on television. Mr. Trump has said he looks forward to taking the vaccine at the appropriate time.

Axios first reported Pence's upcoming vaccination. U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams will also be vaccinated publicly, the vice president's office said.

The office said Pence and the second lady will publicly receive the vaccine "to promote the safety and efficacy of the vaccine and build confidence among the American people."

As head of the White House Coronavirus Task Force and a former governor, Pence has played a significant role in the administration's response, taking the lead on working with governors to fight the virus.

Both the Trump and the Biden administrations have their work cut out for them to build public confidence in the vaccine, which continues to be lower than public health officials would like. The most recent former presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton have all agreed to be vaccinated live on camera.

President-elect Joe Biden is expected to be vaccinated against COVID-19 as soon as next week, transition officials tell CBS News. Earlier Wednesday, Mr. Biden told reporters his aides are making preparations for him to take the vaccine in public.

"I don't want to get ahead of the line but I want to make sure that we demonstrate to the American people that it is safe to take," the president-elect said.

More than 300,000 Americans have died of COVID-19 since the pandemic began, and case numbers continue to rise at an alarming rate. Pfizer's coronavirus vaccine was authorized for emergency use by the FDA on Friday, and top infectious diseases expert Anthony Fauci says the vaccine should be widely available to Americans by spring. Officials are focused on vaccinating health care workers, those in long-term care facilities and vulnerable older Americans first.

The Coronavirus Task Force's Admiral Brett Giroir said on Fox Business Wednesday that the Moderna vaccine will be submitted to the Food and Drug Administration for approval on Thursday, and if approved, the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines will reach 8 million people next week. The FDA saidthe Moderna vaccine shows "no specific safety concerns."

Read the rest here:

Pence to publicly receive COVID-19 vaccine on Friday - CBS News

9 Nevada doctors: Here's why we're getting the COVID-19 vaccine  Reno Gazette Journal

The rest is here:

9 Nevada doctors: Here's why we're getting the COVID-19 vaccine - Reno Gazette Journal

A nearly empty critical care unit at Bartlett Regional Hospital in Juneau in April. (Rashah McChesney/KTOO)

Two Juneau health care workers were treated this week for allergic reactions to the COVID-19 vaccine produced by drug companies Pfizer and BioNTech, including one who had a serious anaphylactic reaction and was hospitalized in the intensive care unit, officials said Wednesday.

The woman, who did not have a history of allergies, spent Tuesday night in the ICU at Juneaus Bartlett Regional Hospital and was taken off epinephrine early Wednesday, officials said at a news conference. She remained in the hospital Wednesday night, hospital officials said.

The second worker experienced eye puffiness, light-headedness and scratchy throat shortly after receiving the vaccine Wednesday, Bartlett officials said in a prepared statement.

The male workers was taken to the hospitals emergency department and was treated with several drugs, the statement said. The mans reaction was not consider anaphylaxis, and he returned to normal with an hour and was released.

Both workers said they did not want their experiences to deter others from being vaccinated, according to the hospital.

The woman who was hospitalized said she was still enthusiastic about having received the shot, and was disappointed to lose her opportunity to be injected with a second dose a few weeks later, Nobel Anderson, one of her doctors.

She encouraged all of us to press on, Anderson said at a Wednesday news conference.

The New York Times first reported the womans reaction Wednesday morning. The mans reaction was announced by the hospital late Wednesday.

The womans anaphylactic reaction is the only one reported in the country so far, the CDCs deputy director for infectious diseases, Dr. Jay Butler, said at the news conference. And the state is not planning any changes to its program for distributing the COVID-19 vaccine, said Dr. Anne Zink, Alaskas chief medical officer.

There were over 40,000 people in the trials and we did not see any reactions like this, she said.

Zink summarized the event by relaying a comment made by one of the providers who treated the womans reaction: Lightnings going to strike somewhere.

Our goal is to be transparent with Alaskans and the public, Zink was quoted as saying in the hospitals statement late Wednesday. We have no plans to change our vaccine schedule, dosing or regimen.

Regulators had already warned medical providers to be on the watch for allergies after reports that two British health care workers also experienced anaphylactic reactions when they were injected with the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine last week. Alaska hospitals are keeping recipients of the vaccine under observation for a period of time after their injections.

Pfizer has said there were no safety signals of concern identified in its clinical vaccine trials, and anaphylactic reactions to vaccines in general are rare, estimated at just over one per million doses.

The womans symptoms began 10 minutes after she was injected with the vaccine, when she felt flush while she was still being monitored in the hospitals foyer, officials said. She took a Benadryl, but still felt short of breath and was transferred to the emergency room, said Lindy Jones, the doctor who treated her there.

Related: COVID-19 vaccinations begin in Alaska

Jones was concerned about an anaphylactic reaction and gave the woman a standard treatment of epinephrine, and she responded immediately, he said. She was also given other antihistamines, including Benadryl and Pepsid, as well as steroids, which Jones described as another standard treatment for anaphylaxis.

Because the womans symptoms returned when she was taken off epinephrine, she was moved to the ICU for observation and kept overnight. Providers plan to discharge her Wednesday evening, assuming theres no further symptoms now that shes off all medication, Jones said.

CDC employees are now working with Bartlett clinicians to analyze results of lab tests given to the Juneau woman, so that they can learn from this experience more, Zink said.

The system worked exactly as you would hope it would in this situation, to make sure that were able to respond and to learn, she said.

Bartlett, along with Anchorages Alaska Native Medical Center, was one of the first places in the state to inject workers with the COVID-19 vaccine Tuesday. Bartlett officials said 144 people had been vaccinated at the hospital by Wednesday evening, with a total of 400 who have signed up to receive shots.

A spokeswoman for ANMC, Shirley Young, said no allergic reactions have occurred at the Anchorage hospital.

Go here to read the rest:

'Lightning's going to strike somewhere': Juneau health care worker hospitalized, another treated after COVID-19 vaccination - Alaska Public Media News

With the United States in its early stages of COVID-19 vaccine distribution, Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer has a warning for residents: Dont pay for the promise of access to the vaccine.

Supplies are scarce, with mass vaccination still months away and scams already cropping up in Europe.

Currently, California is prioritizing high-risk health care workers and those in skilled nursing facilities with the limited number of doses. Officials anticipate about 3 million Californians will be vaccinated at this stage.

Californias teachers, first responders, and grocery and restaurant workers are among those expected to get the next round of vaccines a stage in which the state aims to vaccinate about 8 million residents.

And in a state of about 40 million residents, that means the majority of people wont have access to the vaccine for months to come.

The City Attorney warns that this will bring scams.

While the arrival of a COVID-19 vaccine is terrific news, it wont be available on a widespread basis until late spring or early summer, Feuer said in a video statement. In the meantime, there will be a waitand that is surely an opportunity for scammers to try to sell you fake vaccines that are ineffective at bestand dangerous at worst.

Throughout the pandemic, there have been reports of scams involving fake coronavirus testing kits, contact tracers and so-called cures and treatments.

In one case in May, the L.A. City Attorney sued a company for allegedly selling radish paste as COVID-19 prevention. In another case, a man was arrested on suspicion of falsely claiming to have developed a coronavirus prevention pill and an injectable cure for those infected.

Interpol has issued an alert to law enforcement agencies to prepare for organized crime networks targeting COVID-19 vaccines, saying the pandemic has already triggered unprecedented opportunistic and predatory criminal behaviour.

One worry is that there will be fake COVID-19 vaccines being peddled to unsuspecting residents.

Fake vaccines which havent undergone testing or clinical trials could make you sick, Feuer warned.

European Union police agency Europol on Dec. 4 said it has already found advertisements for fake COVID-19 vaccines on the dark web. The agency shared an image of a listing for fake Pfizer vaccine doses being sold in exchange for bitcoin.

The number of offers is limited at this stage but will likely increase once a legitimate vaccine becomes available, Europol officials said at the time.

Feuer told residents to report any scams to the FTC or contact the L.A. City Attorneys Office online.

If you get a call or a text or an email, or even someone knocking on your door, claiming they can give you early access to the vaccine or that they know someone who can. Thats a scam, Feuer said.

Read the original here:

With COVID-19 vaccines rolling out, L.A. City Attorney warns: 'Don't pay for the promise of access to the vaccine' - KTLA

PIERRE, S.D. (AP) -- Gov. Kristi Noem plans to wait her turn to get a coronavirus vaccine, which will likely be sometime early next year.

Her spokesman, Ian Fury, says the governor "will get the vaccine when it's readily available, after those who need it the most have been given an opportunity to take it."

South Dakota received 7,800 Pfizer doses with additional vaccines coming from drug manufacturer Moderna next week.

Front-line health care workers and long-term care facility residents are receiving the state's first doses, while the general public may be vaccinated the spring

Read this article:

South Dakota governor will wait to get COVID-19 vaccine until next year - KTIV

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) The Tennessee Department of Health has announced next steps regarding the arrival of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccines arrival in Tennessee.

Tennessee expects to receive its first shipment of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine on or around December 21. The state also expects to receive an initial amount of 115,000 doss of the vaccine over the next two weeks, following Emergency Use Authorization issued by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and recommendations from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices.

The Moderna vaccine should be shipped for delivery on Dec. 21 to all 95 Tennessee county health departments.

Smaller hospitals not receiving the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine are expected to receive the Moderna vaccine the week of December 28.

The FDA said Wednesday that vials of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, which are labeled as containing five doses, could include enough of the vaccine to provide six or even seven doses. According to the FDA, these additional doses may be used, meaning Tennessee could have as many as 11,000 more doses of the vaccine than the state originally expected.

We are excited to receive these additional vaccines and see our COVID-19 vaccination activities underway, said Tennessee Health Commissioner Lisa Piercey, MD, MBA, FAAP. Tennessee county health department staff members will administer the Moderna vaccine to first responders, home health care providers and student health care providers in partnership with these organizations and their local community emergency management agencies.

The following table gives specific information about the vaccines Tennessee will receive to date.

Initial supplies of the COVID-19 vaccines are limited. First allocations of both the Moderna and Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines in Tennessee will be used to give first vaccine doses to people who qualify for Phase 1a1, such as health care workers, long-term care facilities residents and staff members, and first responders as detailed in the COVID-19 vaccination plan for Tennessee.

The Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are not interchangeable, meaning each patient must receive two doses of the same vaccine to be protected from COVID-19. Those who choose to get vaccinated will receive a card with the date of their first shot, the name/manufacturer of the vaccine given and the date they should get their second shot.

Tennessees plan for allocation of COVID-19 vaccine has been thoughtfully developed with a focus on how best to serve our diverse populations and communities, and to ensure distribution of vaccination sites across all 95 counties, especially in rural areas and those with high concentrations of people in vulnerable populations, Piercey said.

Tennessees local health departments continue to offer COVID-19 testing five days a week at no charge for anyone wishing to get tested. Testing sites across the state will give self-testing kits for adults three days a week beginning December 21. This will allow staff members to transition to vaccination of frontline health care providers and first responders.

Testing hours and contact information for TDH health department testing sites can be found here.

Stay with News 2 for continuing coverage of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

See original here:

Moderna COVID-19 vaccine to arrive in Tennessee next week, next steps announced - WKRN News 2

In order to see who has been vaccinated, just hover over each county in Texas to see who has received one dose and who has been fully vaccinated.

The dashboard also separates the numbers by phase. There's a way to see how many healthcare professionals in Tier 1 (hospitals and EMS) and Tier 2 (medical offices) have had the vaccine. There's also a way to see how many assisted living and nursing home residents have received it.

The vaccine is currently only available to frontline workers and vulnerable people due to a limited supply. The state reportedly was slated to receive more than 220,000 doses of the vaccine in the first week of distribution, which began on Monday, Dec. 14.

Read the rest here:

How many people in Texas have had the COVID-19 vaccine? - KHOU.com

On December 11, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted emergency use authorization for the first COVID-19 vaccine in the United States, after an expert advisory panel voted overwhelmingly thatits benefits of outweigh the risks.

That vaccine, from Pfizer and BioNTech, is currently being rolled out nationwide. A second vaccine, from Moderna and the National Institutes of Health, is expected to receive authorization within days.

Many people living with HIV are wondering whether the vaccines are appropriate for them and where they will end up in the queue. Reassuringly, current evidence indicates that vaccination is safe for this population, and advocates are asking that HIV-positive people be considered a priority group.

COVID-19 vaccines have been developed with unprecedented speed. Early in the pandemic, National Institutes of Health director Anthony Fauci, MD, predicted that a vaccine could be available in 12 to 18 months, but the authorization beat even that optimistic timeline.

But as often happens when things move this quickly, misinformation can spread as fast as the virus. For example, On December 12, Business Insider published an article suggesting that people with HIV should wait to get the vaccine due to potential safety concerns.

But most experts disagree.

There is no reason to believe that people with HIV should not get the vaccine. It is not a live vaccine, and it is safe and efficacious across diverse groups, Monica Gandhi, MD, MPH, medical director of the Ward 86 HIV clinic at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, told POZ. I will be encouraging my patients with HIV, especially those on antiretroviral therapy, to get the vaccine. I totally recommend it.

Vaccine Safety and Effectiveness

Both the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines employ a novel messenger RNA (mRNA) approach that uses nanoparticles, or fat bubbles, to deliver bits of genetic material that encode instructions for making the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, which the coronavirus uses to enter human cells. When injected into a muscle, the cells produce the protein, triggering an immune response. The mRNA degrades quickly in the body, and it does not alter human genes.

In a Phase III clinical trial of more than 43,000 volunteers, the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was 95.0% effective at reducing the risk of symptomatic COVID-19, according to findings published recently in The New England Journal of Medicine. A total of 170 cases were observed seven days or more after the second dose: 162 in the placebo group and just eight in the vaccine group.

Another Phase III trial, which included about 30,000 people, showed that the Moderna vaccine was 94.1% effective, according to FDA briefing documents released ahead of a public advisory committee meeting on December 17. In this study, there were 196 cases of symptomatic COVID-19 observed at least 14 days after the second dose: 185 in the placebo group and 11 in the vaccine group. Whats more, Moderna presented additional data showing that the vaccine also appears to reduce asymptomatic infection by two thirds.

Both trials enrolled people with stable HIV. Advocates successfully pressured Moderna to change eligibility criteria that initially excluded HIV-positive people and asked Pfizer to clarify that people with HIV were eligible.

The Pfizer trial included 120 people with HIV; they entered the study late and therefore were not included in the primary efficacy and safety analysis. The Moderna trial included 176 people with HIV. In both studies, one HIV-positive person in the placebo group and none in the vaccine group developed symptomatic COVID-19. No unusual safety concerns were reported.

Trials of other COVID-19 vaccine candidates, including those being developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, Johnson & Johnson, Novavax and Sanofi/GlaxoSmithKline, also include people living with HIV.

Considerations for People With HIV

Although these numbers are small, these findings are reassuring. The Pfizer vaccine is indicated for people living with HIV, and it is likely that the Moderna vaccine will be as well.

The FDAs fact sheet for the Pfizer vaccine notes that people who are immunocompromised or are on a medicine that affects your immune system should mention this condition to their vaccine provider. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states in its interim clinical considerations for the Pfizer vaccine: Immunocompromised individuals may still receive COVID-19 vaccination if they have no contraindications to vaccination. However, they should be counseled about the unknown vaccine safety profile and effectiveness in immunocompromised populations, as well as the potential for reduced immune responses and the need to continue to follow allcurrent guidanceto protect themselves against COVID-19.

About two-third of people with HIV in the U.S. have a suppressed viral load, and most these days do not have AIDS or advanced immune suppression. But even people with well-treated HIV may have more subtle immune deficiency and chronic inflammation that could affect coronavirus susceptibility, risk of severe COVID-19 and response to vaccines.

The mRNA approach is thought to be safe for people with HIV. These vaccines do not contain weakened or inactivated SARS-CoV-2, just genetic instructions for making one of its key proteins. There is no way the vaccine can cause COVID-19, even in immunocompromised people, who generally should not receive live vaccines. But a vaccine from the Chinese company Sinopharm, which was recently approved in the United Arab Emirates, does use inactivated SARS-CoV-2.

In October, Susan Buchbinder, MD, of the University of California at San Francisco, and colleagues published a letter in The Lancet expressing concern about the use of an adenovirus vector in COVID-19 vaccines. This type of vaccine uses a common cold virus to deliver genes for SARS-CoV-2 proteins.

More than a decade ago, an HIV vaccine using adenovirus type 5 (Ad5) as a vector appeared to actually increase the risk of HIV acquisition among men in the STEP and Phambili trials who had preexisting immunity to Ad5 due to prior exposure. The authors suggested that preexisting Ad5 antibodies activated by the vaccine might enhance HIV replication in CD4 T cells or make CD4 cells more susceptible to HIV infection.

On the basis of these findings, we are concerned that use of an Ad5 vector for immunization against [SARS-CoV-2] could similarly increase the risk of HIV-1 acquisition among men who receive the vaccine, they wrote. This important safety consideration should be thoroughly evaluated before further development of Ad5 vaccines for SARS-CoV-2.

The Pfizer/BioNTech and ModernamRN vaccines do not use adenovirus vectors. The AstraZeneca/University of Oxford vaccine uses a chimpanzee adenovirus, so preexisting immunity in humans would not be a concern. However, a vaccine being developed by the Chinese company CanSino Biologics does use human Ad5 as a vector, and the Russian Sputnik V vaccine uses both Ad5 and Ad26.

Referring to the Pfizer and AstraZeneca/University of Oxford vaccines, guidance from the British HIV Association (BHIVA) and the Terrence Higgins Trust states:

There is no reason to think these vaccines will be less safe for people with HIV. Both include some of the genetic material from SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19) but not the whole virus. This means they are not live vaccines and so are no less safe in people with damaged immune systems. It is possible that people with HIV might not respond as well to the vaccine. This means that the vaccine might trigger a weaker response in people with HIV.

Should People With HIV Be Prioritized?

Some experts argue that people with HIV should be prioritized to receive COVID-19 vaccines.

Health care workers and residents of long-term care facilitieswill be first in line. After that, other groups vying for priority include frontline essential workers, people over age 65 and those with comorbidities, or underlying health conditions that raise the risk for severe COVID-19 and death.

A National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine committee has issued a framework to help policymakers plan for equitable vaccine allocation.

Their proposed Phase 1b includes people with two or more underlying conditions that put them at significantly higher risk, for example, cancer, chronic kidney or lung disease, serious heart conditions, type 2 diabetes, obesity or immunosuppression due to an organ transplant. Many people living with HIV fall into this category because of coexisting conditions.

Phase 2 consists of people with underlying conditions that put them at moderately higher risk, including any one of the Phase 1b conditions.Other conditions that might put individuals at increased risk should also be considered for prioritization, including asthma, hypertension,immunosuppression due to a bone marrow transplant,HIV/AIDS, liver disease,use of corticosteroid medications and pregnancy.

In the United Kingdom, people with HIV fall into priority group 6 (out of 9), which includes those up to age 64 with underlying health conditions which put them at higher risk of serious disease and mortality. (People over 65 are in in a higher priority group regardless of HIV status.) However, BHIVA notes, some HIV-positive people may be at higher risk and eligible for priority group 4 (clinically extremely vulnerable individuals), including those with a current CD4 count below 50, those who have ever had a very low CD4 count, those with a CD4 count below 200 plus other risk factors such as a detectable viral load or comorbidities, and those with recent serious HIV-related illnesses.

While small early studies did not find that having HIV was associated with a greater risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection or severe COVID-19, some more recent larger studies have seen an association.

In light of this new evidence, and acknowledging the intersectionality of factors that put people at higher risk for COVID-19 that are so prevalent among people living with HIV, a coalition of advocatesincludingAVAC, the Black AIDS Institute, Lets Kick ASS (AIDS Survivor Syndrome), NASTAD, the Prevention Access Campaign, SisterLove, the Treatment Action Group and the Well Projectare issuing an open letter urging the CDCs Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to consider people living with HIV a priority group for the receipt of COVID-19 vaccines.

In addition, NASTAD is calling for state and local vaccination plans to include community networks and trusted providers that are best able to reach communities disproportionately impacted by COVID-19, including health department HIV and hepatitis programs, community-based organizations and harm reduction service providers.

A vaccine presents an incredible opportunity to stem the tide of the COVID-19 pandemic, but only if federal, state, and local governments commit to addressing the systemic racism and inequality that are driving the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on communities of color, NASTAD executive director Stephen Lee said in a statement.COVID-19 has shone a spotlight on the many ways our healthcare system is profoundly broken, including for individuals living with and at risk for HIV and hepatitis.

Click herefor more news aboutCOVID-19 vaccines.

Read this article:

The First COVID-19 Vaccine Is Here. Is It Safe for People With HIV? - POZ

Shawn Hendricks, a Maryland health care worker, always knew she wanted to get vaccinated. Her mother, brother and brother-in-law had already caught the virus, so it hit home personally, but work had also shown her the impact of coronavirus.

Hendricks, nursing director of medicine, was the among the first employees at University of Maryland Medical Center to get vaccinated.

I knew theimpact that the vaccine wouldhave because we need it.I always have felt very stronglythat if we don't widely vaccinate, this pandemicis going to get worse, thenumbers are going to continue toincrease, she said Tuesday.

She says she felt good after getting her shot, and she was observed for a period of time to ensure she had no side effects or adverse effects.

The vaccine is being rolled out while there has been hesitancy in the Black and Latino community to take it. Hendricks says she understands their concern, but having dedicated her life to science and medicine and having done her research, she was willing to get vaccinated.

She added:

Watch:

Link:

The latest on the coronavirus pandemic and vaccines: Live updates - CNN