Never in the history of electronic health records has there been a more important public health recordkeeping task than the one that is at hand at this very moment in the nations history: tracking COVID-19 vaccinations.
As a result of this all-important development, EHR vendors from across the industry have been preparing their products and their healthcare provider organization users to make sure that when a patient receives this critical vaccination, it is recorded correctly, pushed to the necessary parties, and is accessible now and in the future by all the appropriate caregivers.
Healthcare IT News discussed this huge issue with top executives at Allscripts, athenahealth, Cerner, DrChrono, Epic, Greenway Health, Meditech and NextGen Healthcare.
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They offered insights into preparations that began earlier this year, described the changes theyve made to their EHR systems and discussed how theyve been rolling out and helping train for these new design and workflow changes.
Meditech has had its Coronavirus Task Force up and running this year, assisting clients through all stages of their pandemic response.
As word of a vaccine started to circulate, we were already working with customer advisory boards to determine what steps would be needed for preparation, looking to our Immunization Registry and patient registries as solutions for tracking and reporting on vaccine administration, said Helen Waters, executive vice president at Meditech. We are fully vested in ensuring our customers are well-positioned to hit the ground running.
The EHR maker said of course its work required guidance from the CDC, HHS, public health officials and industry organizations. These efforts ramped up on Oct.29, when the company attended the CDC Operation Warp Speed Town Hall.
Helen Waters, Meditech
Here, the CDC informed us of the vaccine codes that would be available and urged vendors to build these codes into their system ASAP, Waters explained. Since the codes were released on Nov.12, we have updated our customers by sharing these codes along with vaccine guidance. Also, we immediately began working with our interoperability team to review the CDCs HL7 draft specifications.
Meditech continues to attend weekly EHRA/CDC breakout meetings to monitor evolving updates provided by the CDC. In addition, it is collaborating with its Meditech User Group, MUSE, and soliciting feedback from its customer base through email surveys.
Providing the solutions and guidance to support our customers through this critical venture and bring an end to this pandemic remains Meditechs top priority, with all divisions fully invested in these efforts, Waters said.
Cerner began preparing for potential COVID-19 vaccines back in April as cases were rising in the U.S. It then ramped up efforts by mid-summer to make sure its solutions and clients were ready.
At that time, Cerner recognized that some of its clients would play a community-wide vaccination role and would need a patient-first strategy that included tools outside of the companys core EHR workflow.
When it became clearer in October that an approved vaccine was likely in early 2021, we engaged with the CDC and some of its information technology suppliers in order to successfully interoperate with federal and state registries, said Dr. David Nill, vice president and chief medical officer at Cerner. We needed to make sure that our clients were ready on the IT front to handle such a monumental and important task.
Cerner was able to put in place many of its model recommendations for the fall flu campaign, gaining insights to modify the workflow based on recommendations for COVID-19 vaccine administration, he added.
At NextGen Healthcare, preparations for vaccine administration and reporting began several months ago. Dr. Robert Murry, chief medical information officer, said the EHR vendor initially focused on the four areas most important to its ambulatory clients:
EHR company athenahealth has been focused on rapidly responding to the COVID-19 pandemic and supporting its customers all year.
We made the first COVID-driven changes available to all our practices back on Jan.29 when there were only a handful of confirmed cases in the U.S., said Paul Brient, chief product officer at athenahealth. We deployed COVID screening questions, diagnostic test ordersand direct links to the latest CDC recommendations to all our providers overnight.
Dr. David Nill, Cerner
The vendor is fortunate to have a cloud-based, single-instance EHR that enables changes to be made quickly and immediately available to all provider clients, he added.
Since then, we have pushed out approximately 150 updates ranging from updated assessment content to align to initial CDC travel and exposure guidance, to updated code sets for COVID-19, to patient testing and risk dashboards for our practices to monitor their panels, to workflow enhancements for remote and in-car check in all delivered immediately in the cloud to the entire athenahealth network, he explained.
The companys preparedness for a COVID-19 vaccine began in spring 2020. It kicked off a research effort to understand how its practices were managing their patient populations with risk stratification, patient outreach and testing protocols. It also spent time learning what it could from experience with past flu vaccination efforts. All these learnings are foundational to identifying and engaging patients as COVID-19 vaccines become available, Brient said.
As more details of vaccines emerge, we have a team of subject matter experts working to understand the requirements and distribution guidelines defined by the federal government and states in order to provide best practice workflow recommendations and support to our practices, he said.
This includes staying abreast of registry updates, partnering with clients that are participating in early vaccination efforts,and making updates to our global compendiums and code libraries as soon as they are available.
Allscripts has been participating in conversations with HHS, the CDC and Operation Warp Speed through the course of the pandemic, most recently meeting weekly to address the need to track and report vaccine administration.
The good news is that there are no changes yet from a federal perspective that require EHR development because we have met the existing ONC certification requirements associated with connectivity to immunization registries, said Leigh Burchell, vice president of government affairs at Allscripts.
The only area in which we are finding ourselves having to do new development specific to tracking the COVID-19 vaccines is where some states are requesting the transmission of unique data elements. We certainly favor a more consistent approach rather than the state-by-state adjustments to what is necessary to be reported.
Dr. Robert Murry, NextGen Healthcare
At Greenway Health, the primary concern is ensuring its healthcare organization clients have what they need to properly document immunizations and communicate with patients and government bodies seamlessly without any workflow disruptions.
As pharmaceutical companies began their efforts to develop COVID-19 vaccines in earnest with Operation Warp Speed, Greenway Health simultaneously initiated a cross-company initiative to ensure our two EHR solutions were enhanced to support our ambulatory care providers as they began to administer the vaccines, said Dr. Michael Blackman, chief medical officer.
In parallel, Greenway Health participated alongside other EHR vendors in Electronic Health Records Association-led discussions with the CDC, HHS and the state immunization registries to stay abreast of the fast-moving events related to the rollout of the vaccine. As an industry, its vital that EHR vendors all fully understand and meet the governments data requirements that are required by providers to fulfill, Blackman said.
Daniel Kivatinos, COO and co-founder of DrChrono, said his companys product is a flexible software platform.
The platform has an electronic medical records app with powerful technology that enables a medical practice to build a practice in a bespoke way, he said. With different options for tracking fields, a practice for example can select a custom field creating a field tied to the medical record for COVID-19 vaccines allowing data points and record keeping.
DrChrono also offers other fields that can be created in the custom note, along with tailored tagging. Depending on the practice, a care team can configure the EHR to best suit their needs, he added.
At EHR giant Epic, the company recently released software updates specific to the COVID-19 vaccine. Dr. Nichole Quick, who works on the clinical informatics team at Epic, explained that these updates include:
The vendor is adding these updates to an array of tools, Quick said, that customers already use to facilitate and track tens of millions of annual vaccine administrations:
Meditech said it views vaccine distribution holistically, taking into account the importance of patient safety, the speed with which this has to happen, the volume of individuals who are going to need to be vaccinated, and the timeframe and sequence of the vaccine requirements.
Our approach is to remain agile, as there are a number of factors to consider, including the different vaccine manufacturers, eligibility phases by state, whether the patient is known or unknown to a facility, whether the patient has comorbidities and risk factors, and where the vaccine will be administered, said Waters of Meditech. Vaccine distribution requires careful collaboration across all venues of care, as well as across all distribution sites across the community.
Paul Brient, athenahealth
To guide its clients, Meditech is providing best practice guidance and scenarios for vaccine administration across each of its integrated care areas (for example, practice, acute, ED, LTC and clinics) to ensure the best possible outcome, Waters added.
We understand that vaccine administration is not a one-size-fits-all approach, so were preparing our customers for a variety of scenarios, she said. As frontline workers will be among the first vaccinated, were tracking them in our EHR. Registries will be available to identify other eligible patients for vaccine distribution according to phase-based guidelines and FDA and CDC recommendations.
For those patients known to an organization, clinicians benefit from embedded clinical decision support, which helps identify patients who are high-risk or immunocompromised, including those with severe allergies or pre-existing conditions and women who are pregnant, she said. Clinicians can view comprehensive EHR data, including allergies and medications, to identify potential risks or conflicts based on FDA guidelines, she added.
In addition, they can see if a patient is under treatment for other conditions, Waters explained. We are also providing a short form, web-based mobile solution that supports the capture of the COVID-19 immunization quickly from any venue such as a drive-up site without an appointment and medical record on file. This is particularly important for high-volume vaccination sites, where the patient is not always known to the health system.
Since the vaccine will be distributed in two doses, it is equally important to accurately track and share which dose was given and when. Meditech is enabling its clients to track vaccine distribution across its EHR and communicate important distribution details with state, federal and third-party sources, including distribution date, dose and manufacturer, Waters said.
Per CDC guidelines, our system will produce a certificate as proof of the individuals vaccination to present as required, she said. We also offer a bidirectional immunization registry to report vaccine administrations to the state, and to verify whether a patient has received a first dose elsewhere and which pharmaceutical company manufactured that dose.
Leigh Burchell, Allscripts
But the safest way to ensure a patient receives the correct second dose is by having that patient return to the same location, Waters contended. To encourage this, Meditechs scheduling solution includes inherent decision support to drive the vaccine appointment sequence, with proactive confirmation and reminders shared with the patient, she explained.
Finally, we are making it easy for our customers to seek appropriate reimbursement from a program or plan that covers related COVID-19 vaccine fees by patient, without charging the patient, she said. Our emphasis is on achieving these goals as efficiently as possible. This will be a large-scale endeavor, and creating solutions that work for a variety of scenarios is imperative. We are approaching this challenge as an opportunity to support our customer needs in an agile manner.
Cerner is preparing end-to-end model workflow recommendations for U.S. and non-U.S. healthcare organization clients that incorporate patient outreach, scheduling opportunities, clinician administration best practices, billing, and reporting and analytics tracking after administration.
Reminder outreach is essential because some COVID-19 vaccines require two doses for full efficacy, said Nill of Cerner.
The recommendations also can include an optional mass vaccination solution at no cost to our clients, helping to supplement rapid vaccination without sacrificing safety checks or administration documentation, he explained. Mass vaccination procedures help make it quick to register patients, identify vaccines needed and document administration of vaccines at a large scale.
For example, Boston Childrens Hospital has successfully used Mass Vaccination this fall to expand its flu vaccination efforts to its parking garage and additional non-office based clinics.
The EHR maker has reached out to clients big and small, urban and rural, to understand their plans and best support and prepare their EHR domains appropriately ahead of receiving the vaccine, Nill added.
In addition, we have offered several webinars, office hours and client workflow discussions to prepare the ideal socially distanced workflow, including drive-through vaccination, he said.
Athenahealth has healthcare organization clients participating in some of the first vaccinations. Even before the emergency use authorizations were approved, and as NDC, CVX and MVX assignments were being finalized, the EHR maker updated its drug compendium to include available COVID-19 vaccine orderables. Brient said the company has been working to understand how best to support these early sites and respond in near-real time to make sure they are successful.
We will continue to stay very close to the evolving guidance and protocols from CMS, he said. In addition, we are examining our entire vaccine and patient management workflow so that we can best support our clients in this very important and unique effort. Both the transition to high numbers of telehealth visits and the high volume of COVID testing have necessitated important changes to our software.
Dr. Michael Blackman, Greenway Health
The high volumes of vaccines (and unique requirements such as two-dose vaccines) similarly require changes to the core athenaOne workflows to allow practices to operate optimally, Brient added.
We have a cross-divisional working group that is considering all our clients diverse needs and is spearheading enhancements and workflow guidance across a myriad of use cases, he noted. This includes identifying patients, or healthcare workers, who are high priority for a vaccine; engaging patients around COVID vaccination; managing the coordination and scheduling of patients across the two vaccine doses; properly documenting vaccinations according to guidelines; and reporting across clinical measure, registry and billing needs.
All enhancements will be deployed immediately to all clients as soon as they are available, he added.
At NextGen Healthcare, the vaccine administration workflow will be identical in the NextGen Enterprise EHR to other vaccines.
As an ambulatory EHR vendor, we have thousands of practices administering a variety of vaccines currently, with some practices administering hundreds of vaccines a day now for example, large pediatric practices, said Murry of NextGen Healthcare. So all of the workflows, safeguards, handoffs, inventory controls, billing mechanisms, automated reporting, etc., that are currently well-known will be utilized for COVID-19 vaccines as well.
The EHR and population health tools enable providers to document the particular vaccine provided to each patient. Once the reporting requirements at the state and federal level become available, the mode of transfer of this data and the specific data elements can be determined, he said.
The most important thing is that at least at this point there should not be major changes to EHR workflow, said Blackman of Greenway Health.
Clinicians should be able to administer vaccines the way they always do, and our products can transmit this information to state immunization registries, he said. There are certain new optional data elements the CDC is requiring from registries, such as identifying demographic priority groups. The registries may, in turn, require these additional elements from providers.
Dr. Nichole Quick, Epic
The vendor said it continues to monitor the situation closely as this aspect is still in flux.
From a product development standpoint, we are making sure that the clinical terminology sets our products rely on include the necessary drug and procedure codes to support the COVID-19 vaccines, and that our interoperability connections with state registries continue to facilitate immunization reporting, he noted.
Over the past several weeks, Epic healthcare provider organization clients have joined webinars led by Epic experts who have walked through system setup and recommended operational workflows.
Most of the changes weve made to the software that are specific to the COVID-19 vaccine are turned on automatically, so theres very little manual setup involved allowing our customers to focus on adjustments that are specific to their organization, Quick explained. Weve also published written guidance that ranges from high-level, executive-facing recommendations to detailed technical instructions.
Most of the development for the COVID-19 vaccine already is complete, and the final updates will be finished and available to clients worldwide by the end of December, she added.
Meditechs most important concern has been determining how to record the vaccine data and leverage the depth of an integrated EHR as efficiently as possible.
Weve supplied customers with build guidelines for new vaccine codes and easy access to frequently asked questions to make them aware of preparations they can make today to be ready to administer these vaccines as they become available, said Waters of Meditech. Training is the key to success. Our customer service team works with customers daily on training and preparedness to ensure content has been updated and modified to reflect this guidance.
Key guidance includes how to enter data quickly into the system and how to create appointment reminders to assist with COVID-19 vaccination preparation. Meditech also is training clients on its new mobile offering for high-volume vaccine administration locations for individuals who are not patients of a health system.
One of the benefits of our EHR is its flexibility, Waters contended. As updated guidelines become available, we will continue to proactively communicate with our customers through a variety of channels.
Right now, athenahealth is working jointly with its clients that are participating in early vaccine distribution to understand their needs and support them as those needs evolve, Brient said.
A key element of this work is to formally document our learnings so we can provide training and coaching for clients as we roll out enhancements and workflow recommendations, he said. This training is provided in informative best practices guides within our software. As we did in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, we will make these enhancements immediately available to all our clients across our cloud-based EHR as soon as they are ready.
The goal is that most users will be able to adopt these changes without training, but for users who need training or have unique workflows, the company has named customer success managers who can provide any additional support clients need to begin successfully administering, managing and recording vaccines, he added.
Since DrChrono has a cloud-based EHR, it is able to roll out new features and enhancements every week; it trains users on new features weekly via ongoing webinars, posting information to its YouTube channel and putting updated content in its knowledge base.
We have a dedicated account management team that works to keep our user base informed, Kivatinos said. We are accustomed to making changes fast; for example, when COVID-19 hit the United States, the DrChrono team created a large effort quickly to roll out a telehealth solution, creating a telehealth offering within a short window and training our user base on the telehealth offering.
Murry of NextGen Healthcare said most users do not need additional training since the workflow is similar to what they already use for vaccination management and reporting.
The key difference will be new specific COVID-19 coding, he explained. Tracking would need to be improved to strip out, document and record only COVID-19 vaccination information for transmission to the CDC. We are working toward making the first system changes that allow documentation of vaccine administration with the new CPT/CVX codes available to our clients as soon as possible.
Communication with clients will be more critical than the training aspect because each states circumstances are different, he said.
We are meeting with all constituents by specialty and market to help them prioritize a plan for their specific situation.
Twitter:@SiwickiHealthITEmail the writer:bsiwicki@himss.orgHealthcare IT News is a HIMSS Media publication.
Oregon nurses and doctors have been receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. Are EMTs and paramedics next in line?
by: Amanda Arden
PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) Oregons first frontline medical workers began receiving the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine Wednesday, and an official with Metro West Ambulance says the states first EMS workers will likely be vaccinated by the end of this week.
KOIN 6 News spoke to Shawn Baird, vice president of rural services for the Metro West family of companies, on Monday. Hes been communicating with the Oregon Health Authority on distributing the vaccine to paramedics and EMTs.
According to Baird, the first group of EMS workers who will receive the vaccine, among the Metro West companies, will be in Clatsop County. Their vaccinations will likely occur before the end of the week. Baird said these EMS workers are receiving them first because theyve partnered with a hospital in Astoria to receive an allocation of vaccines.
Baird said its hard to say which EMS workers will receive the vaccines next. It depends on availability and on how each county distributes them.
Hopefully over the coming weeks, with any luck, theyre talking about numbers that we could, maybe, by the first of the year have most all of our licensed staff vaccinated, Baird said.
After nurses and doctors at local hospitals began receiving the vaccine on Wednesday, Dec. 16, some people contacted KOIN 6 News saying they were concerned EMS staff wouldnt be prioritized with other frontline workers.
However, according to the Oregon Health Authoritys Phase 1a Vaccine Sequencing Plan, EMS providers and other first responders are included in the first group of health care personnel who will be vaccinated.
Non-emergency medical transport personnel are included in Group 3.
Baird said nothing has changed and EMS workers are still among the first in line to receive the vaccine, its just going to take some time to get everyone in Group 1 vaccinated.
Last week we started seeing the first shipments trickle into Oregon, but we saw, I dont know the exact number, a few thousand doses come in and we have hundreds of thousands of eligible healthcare workers, Baird explained.
He said its possible some paramedics will receive the vaccine before others, depending on the kind of risks they face in their daily duties. He said some paramedics treat more COVID-19 patients than others.
According to Baird, not all of Metro Wests EMS staff in each county will be vaccinated on the same day. He said they want to make sure they have enough staff available in case some people have a reaction to the vaccine.
He said hes optimistic that as the Moderna vaccine is shipped to Oregon, it will be easier to get to more EMS workers in rural parts of the state, since its a more stable vaccine and doesnt need to be stored at such a low temperature.
Follow KOIN 6 for the latest news and weather
Former Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said Monday coronavirus vaccines will likely require updates every few years as surface proteins on the virus evolve to become unrecognizable to antibodies.
Gottlieb told CNBC co-hosts that while current COVID-19 vaccines and prior immunity are likelyeffective against the newly mutated strain of the virus rapidly circulating in the U.K., the evolving virus will necessitate surveillance by sequencing.
CORONAVIRUS MUTATION NOT VACCINE-RESISTANT, CURRENT, FUTURE SURGEON GENERALS BELIEVE
"We thought every two, or maybe three years, I was saying that probably 6-8 months ago, every three years, that might still be the case," Gottlieb said, referring to a potential timeframefor updated COVID-19 vaccines. "I dont think this is something we need to update every season, but if it becomes easy to update it, you may do that, you may look at what the predominant strain is and try to update it more regularly."
U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has warned the mutated strain could be 70% more transmissible, though this figure was based on earlyprojections and there is still significant uncertainty around the issue. Nevertheless, Johnson announced Tier 4 restrictions over the weekend, ushering in new lockdowns in London and southeast England to curb the spread of the mutated virus strain.
CUOMO: UK'S COVID-19 MUTATION 'IS ON A PLANE TO JFK' WITHOUT TESTING
Officials have said mutations in viruses are quite common, and while the flu evolves and requires an updated vaccine annually, Gottlieb expects the virus causing COVID-19 disease, SARS-CoV-2, to evolve at a slower pace. However, some viruses cannot change their surface proteins, such as the measles, the former FDA chief said.
"We now think that this is more transmissible," he said."It doesnt seem to have mutated the surface proteins of the virus in a way that they would slip past our vaccines or prior immunity, in fact, we dont think that thats the case.
"But what this does suggest is that the virus probably will evolve its surface proteins in a way that they wont be recognized by the antibodies we have right now and we will have to update the vaccines."
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Gottlieb added that using the entire spike protein in the vaccines will prove beneficial due to a so-called polyclonal response.
"Were developing antibodies to many different regions of that protein, so even if one part of that protein were mutated, and some antibodies no longer recognize it, there would be antibodies to other parts of that protein," he explained.
The former FDA head says a future framework for updating COVID-19 vaccines will likely pivot around antibody responses or so-called immunogenicity data. However, scientists are still working to understand what level of induced antibodies will offer lasting protection.
Gottlieb also flagged possible issues stemming from antigen and antibody tests, potentially primed to a specific region of the spike protein, and upon change,the virus "could potentially slip past those tests."
The news comes as Johnson sets to convene the government's emergency committee Monday after France closed its borders to arrivals from the U.K. to stem the spread of the new strain.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
A watershed moment has arrived for many families: This week health care workers from CVS and Walgreens, under contract from the federal government, will fan out to nursing homes across the country to begin vaccinating residents against the coronavirus. The shots not only will help protect the nations elderly and infirm and the staff who care for them but they raise the prospect of ending the devastating isolation many residents have felt for months.
Family members are hopeful that before too long, they will return to visiting parents and grandparents, aunts, uncles and other loved ones regularly again. We checked with experts on some common questions.
Probably not in a big way. Restrictions vary by state, and the federal governments guidance on what it considers safe stands for now. They already allow visits under certain conditions. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, or C.M.S., recommended in September that outdoor visits with residents be allowed and indoor visits, too, if the facility has been free of cases for 14 days.
Some medical experts have said that those guidelines are too lax and that visits should be severely restricted, even banned. However, some of these experts are now saying that the vaccine changes the equation, somewhat.
Once all residents are vaccinated, it opens the door for loosening of restrictions, said Dr. Michael Wasserman, the immediate past president of the California Association of Long Term Care Medicine, a geriatrician and former executive at nursing home chains.
To allow visits, Dr. Wasserman recommends all residents of a nursing home should be vaccinated (unless they have some condition or allergy that would discourage vaccination on medical grounds); all staff members should be vaccinated; and the nursing home should have the ability to ensure that visitors test negative for the coronavirus and have been disciplined about wearing a mask in public settings.
The clinical trials of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine included people over 65, and results showed it to be safe and to work as well in older people as in younger ones.
This vaccine has gone through testing and clinical trials to ensure it meets the highest safety standards. It also is safe to get if you already had the virus, says a campaign to encourage people to get the shots by the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living, a combined trade group representing nursing homes and assisted-living communities.
The lead administrator for C.M.S., Seema Verma, reinforced the confidence in the shot for older patients, including those with health conditions, in a statement last week: I urge states to prioritize nursing homes and vulnerable seniors in their distribution of the vaccine.
The point is echoed by Dr. Sabine von Preyss-Friedman, chief medical officer of Avalon Health Care Group, which operates nursing homes, who said the new vaccines appear safe and effective.
With distribution of a coronavirus vaccine beginning in the U.S., here are answers to some questions you may be wondering about:
The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines both require two injections the initial shot and a booster three or four weeks later. Dr. von Preyss-Friedman recommends waiting at least two weeks after the second shot to have a visit.
You hope these vaccines work, but these are elderly patients, she said. You want to err on the side of protection.
She said that, ideally, the visitor would also be vaccinated as well. Since shots wont be widely available for a few months, it may be best to wait until you get your vaccine. Until then, she believes nursing homes should consider visits on a case-by-case basis.
Absolutely, medical experts said. This is particularly true if they are not vaccinated, but even after they are vaccinated until rates in the community go down, said Dr. Joshua Uy, a geriatrician and associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School and the medical director of Renaissance Healthcare & Rehabilitation Center, a nursing home in Philadelphia.
Dr. Uy said that he hopes that the federal government would supply enough personal protective equipment so that all visitors and residents could be properly gowned for such visits.
The combined nursing-home and assisted-living trade group has started a program aimed at helping nursing homes and other care facilities to explain to residents the essential need to get the vaccine. The campaign, #getvaccinated, notes: The elderly population has a much higher risk for getting very sick, being hospitalized, or dying from Covid-19. The vaccine has been shown to provide a great deal of protection against serious illness due to Covid-19.
But the people they love most may have more effective persuasive powers. Families can help, Dr. Uy said, by encouraging their parents and grandparents in nursing homes to get vaccinated.
The vaccine, he said, is going to be our way out.
Vice President Mike Pence received the COVID-19 vaccine on December 18. USA TODAY
After months of tragedy and turmoil that have left more than 310,000 people in the U.S. dead, thearrival of a vaccine for COVID-19 has brought fresh hope that the end of the coronavirus pandemic is in sight and the top members of the U.S. government are lining up to demonstrate that shots are safe and effective.
Experts say it is important for top government officials to be among the first to receive doses of the vaccine in order to boostconfidence among the American people, half of whom are either uncertain about getting it or flatly opposed, according to a recent poll by The Associated Press. Inoculating top government officials is also part of a plan to ensure the continuity of government.
Here are the top officials who have received the vaccination so far.
Pence,the head of the White House's coronavirus task force, was vaccinated for COVID-19Dec. 18 ina live, televisedevent, along with his wife, Karen Pence.
Pence was given the vaccine developed by Pfizer that is being distributed throughout the country. He is expected to receive the second dose of the vaccine in early January.
"Karen and I hope this step today will be a source of confidence and of comfort to the American people," Pence said.
Brian Monahan, the Attending Physician of the United States Congress, administers the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.,in the U.S. Capitol Building on Dec. 18, 2020 in Washington.(Photo: Pool, Getty Images)
Pelosiwas given the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine Dec. 18.
"Today, with confidence in science & at the direction of the Office of the Attending Physician, I received the COVID-19 vaccine," Pelosi said in a tweet. "As the vaccine is being distributed, we must all continue mask wearing, social distancing & other science-based steps to save lives & crush the virus."
McConnell announced he had been inoculated less than an hour after Pelosi.
"Just received the safe, effective COVID vaccine following continuity-of-government protocols. Vaccines are how we beat this virus," McConnell tweeted, adding he had to get back to work to finish negotiating a new coronavirus relief package.
Schumer announced that he received the COVID-19 vaccine in a tweet on Dec. 19.
At the advice of the attending physician in the Capitol, I received the first of two shots of the COVID-19 vaccine today, Schumer tweeted. The vaccine is safe and effective, and I encourage everyone to take it as it becomes available.
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Police, firefighters, teachers and grocery workers will be among those next in line for a COVID-19 vaccine, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory panel decided Sunday.
The committee voted 13-1 to recommend that Phase 1b include people 75 and older and front-line essential workers. Phase 1c will include people 65 to 74 and people 16 to 64 who have high-risk medical conditions, along with other essential workers.
"My hope is that these short-term recommendations will support efficiency and equity in every phase of vaccination until we can get to the time when all individuals have access to safe and effective vaccines in the U.S. and worldwide," said Dr. Grace Lee, a professor of pediatrics at Stanford University School of Medicine and committee member.
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices began its deliberations Sunday morning and spent the day discussing who would follow front-line health care workers and people in long-term care facilities in receiving vaccines, a second phase that could begin in February. The committee is responsible for recommending who gets what vaccines when.
They made difficult decisions that were based on getting a vaccine as quickly as possible to people at the greatest risk of contracting COVID-19 and those who will suffer the most severe outcomes, said Dr. Sharon Fry of the Saint Louis University Medical School and a committee member.
"There are no perfect recommendations. and people will continue to become ill with this disease and die from the disease until there are adequate vaccines. So please, I will plead also for our leaders and the government to move quickly on this and support this effort," she said.
There are now two COVID-19 vaccines in use in the United States. The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was authorized by the Food and Drug Administration on Dec. 11. The Moderna vaccine was authorized Friday and should begin arriving at hospitals on Monday.
The United States has created a phased vaccination plan for the coronavirus because there won't be enough vaccine in the beginning of the rollout.
Phase 1a includes front-line health care workers and people in long-term care facilities.
"Essential workers are at high risk because of exposure, by virtue of being in contact with others, in performing their duties. Prevention of disease in essential workers may reduce transmission to others," said Dr. Kathleen Dooling, a CDC physician who is co-lead on the advisory committee's COVID-19 Vaccines Working Group.
These workers are considered essential to the functioning of society and are at substantially higher risk of exposure to SARS-Co/V-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. They make up about 30 million people among these groups:
First responders such as firefighters, police
Teachers, support staff, day care workers
Food and agriculture workers
Manufacturing workers
Correction workers
U.S. Postal Service workers
Public transit workers
Grocery store workers
Tho essential workers in Phase 1c make up about 57 million people and would include:
Public health workers
Transportation and logistics workers
Food service workers
Construction workers
Finance workers
IT & Communications workers
Energy workers
Media workers
Legal workers
Public safety engineers
Water and wastewater workers
Medical conditions with sufficient evidence to have been associated with severe COVID-19 disease include:
Obesity
Type 2 diabetes
COPD, or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
Heart condition
Chronic kidney disease
Immunocompromised state from solid organ transplant
Sickle cell disease
Pregnancy
Smoker (current or with a history of smoking)
Phase 2 would include all people 16 and over who were not in Phase 1 who are recommended for the vaccination. That means people 16 and over with high-risk medical conditions.
Because vaccine supplies are initially limited, Phase 1b isn't expected to begin until February.
Operation Warp Speed, the White House COVID-19 vaccine and treatment accelerator, has said it expects to distribute 20 million doses in December, 60 million in January and 100 million by February. That's 180 million doses by the end of February, which means 90 million people would be fully vaccinated. (Both the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines require two doses.)
Exactly how the 20 million doses will be distributed by the end of the month is not clear. Last week, 2.9 million doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine were distributed. This week, another 2 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine will be distributed, together with 5.9 million doses of the Moderna vaccine.
More vaccines are in the pipeline. Another candidate, from Johnson & Johnson, fully enrolled its large-scale human trial Thursday and expects to report its first safety and effectiveness data in January.
A fourth, created by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, is a few weeks behind, and a fifth candidate, by vaccine developer Novavax of Gaithersburg, Maryland, is expected to begin its major U.S. trial shortly.
If all or most of these come through, there should be plenty of vaccine by the end of next summer to cover every American who wants one.
Contributing: Karen Weintraub
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: COVID-19 vaccine: Police, firefighters, teachers will be next in line
COVID-19 vaccines: the pandemic will not end overnight The Lancet
A new $900 billion coronavirus stimulus deal has finally been struck but U.S. stocks are falling.
Fears over a new strain of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, discovered in the U.K., have spooked investors at the beginning of Christmas week. The U.K.s health minister Matt Hancock warned that the new strain, said to be highly infectious, was out of control as the government scrapped a planned relaxation of the rules over the holiday period. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the strain could be 70% more transmittable.
A number of European countries, including France, Italy and the Netherlands have suspended all travel to and from the U.K. Italy has also detected a patient with the new strain.
The developments have brought a return to uncertainty, hitting global stocks early on Monday. Despite the COVID-19 aid deal, the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +0.12% fell 0.9% in early trading, before recovering to trade 0.3% down, while the pan-European Stoxx 600 SXXP, -2.33% was 2.3% lower.
In our call of the day, Markets.com analyst Neil Wilson described the market move as near-term volatility and said corrections of this nature are to be expected on the road to full vaccine deployment.
This is the kind of near-term volatility we can expect until the full force of vaccines is felt. There has been a lot of hope already priced in with the vaccine-inspired November rally so we cannot expect a straight line higher for stocks, he said in a note on Monday.
He added that the rotation trade was unwinding, at least in the U.K., due to tighter measures and travel restrictions, with oil companies BP BP, -4.90% and Royal Dutch Shell RDSB, -5.67% and British Airways owner IAG IAG, -7.96% among the notable fallers, and online grocer Ocado OCDO, +5.57% and food-delivery company Just Eat Takeaway JET, +1.88% among the few European stocks rising.
With the full impact of the vaccine some months away, Wilson warned investors to be prepared for a rough ride. The cavalry may be coming but the homesteaders need to batten down the hatches and face another onslaught before they arrive, he said.
After closing 0.4%, or 124.32 points, lower on Friday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +0.12% was 0.2% lower into afternoon trading after recovering from steeper losses. The S&P 500 SPX, -0.39% fell 0.8% and the Nasdaq Composite COMP, -0.10% slipped 0.7%. The discovery of a new strain of coronavirus in the U.K. was to blame for the negativity, with European stocks hit hardest. The German DAX DAX, -2.82% fell 2.8% and the French CAC PX1, -2.43% dropped 2.4%.
The pound GBPUSD, -0.43% tumbled 1.3% as a result of countries banning travel to the U.K. amid the new virus strain and a lack of progress in the Brexit trade deal talks. Sterlings weakness mitigated losses for the internationally-exposed FTSE 100 UKX, -1.73%, which declined 1.7% lower. Oil prices CL00, -0.46% BRN00, -0.29% fell sharply on concerns the new strain will hit demand.
Our chart of the day from Fundstrat shows that the percentage of the U.S. with falling cases is at 38% the highest level since early October, which its analysts said may suggest the third wave has peaked. But they added that the situation in California was pretty serious.
Biotech Moderna MRNA, -1.38% began distributing its COVID-19 vaccine on Sunday, the second vaccine to be authorized in the U.S.
The European Union authorized its first vaccine against COVID-19 on Monday, joining the U.K. and the U.S. in approving the Pfizer PFE, -0.80% and BioNTech BNTX, +2.13% jab.
A suggestive tweet by Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk has led to a discussion about a potential $1-trillion favor for Tesla shareholders.
Tesla TSLA, -6.49% stock debuted as an S&P 500 index component with a thud, as it opened 4.1% lower, before extending losses.
Anglo-Dutch oil major Royal Dutch Shell RDSB, -5.67% said it expects to book charges of between $3.5 billion and $4.5 billion in the fourth quarter due to write-downs, asset restructuring and onerous contracts. The stock fell 3.7% in early trading.
Pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline GSK, -1.18% said on Monday that the European Union has granted market authorization for ViiV Healthcares long-acting HIV treatment Vocabria.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo called it reprehensible and grossly negligent to allow U.K. travelers to fly into JFK Airport without being tested despite a contagious new mutations of coronavirus shutting down London.
Couple holds 10,000 guest drive-thru wedding.
A giant computer-generated version of singer Rita Ora will arrest anyone trying to leave London, a viral Twitter TWTR, -2.20% joke warns.
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This is part one in a three-part series. Click here to read part two.
Aired 12/21/20 on KPBS News
Listen to this story by Claire Trageser.
Community outbreaks of COVID-19 have touched every corner of San Diego County and all types of establishments over the past nine months, but they are most prevalent in big box stores, restaurants and group living situations like nursing homes and jails, according to county outbreak records obtained exclusively by KPBS.
If youve gone out at all since the pandemic first struck, you quite likely walked into a place where an outbreak occurred, according to the KPBS analysis of 1,006 outbreak records dating from March through the end of November. For example:
At least 208 outbreaks have occurred in restaurants, with popular chains like Olive Garden, Cheesecake Factory, Dennys and The Broken Yolk Cafe having multiple outbreaks each.
At least 205 outbreaks have occurred in businesses with services that run the gamut from car repair to pet care to banking and shipping.
At least 125 outbreaks have occurred in large retailers and grocery stores like Walmart, Costco, Target, Home Depot and Trader Joes.
Editors note: This interactive map and searchable database contains records obtained by KPBS of COVID-19 community outbreaks in San Diego County. When viewing these records it is important to keep in mind that just because you visited a place that had an outbreak doesnt necessarily mean you were exposed to the virus. And it doesn't mean you can catch COVID-19 by going there now. By the countys definition, an outbreak occurs when three or more people with COVID-19, who aren't close contacts, were known to be in a specific location during the same 14-day period. It's possible none of them caught the virus at the outbreak location. And being the site of an outbreak doesn't necessarily mean the businesses had unsafe practices.COVID-19 is a virus that spreads easily without fear or favor. KPBS is releasing the outbreak locations because transparency and public health information is vital for our community.
However, just because you visited a place that had an outbreak doesnt necessarily mean you were exposed to the virus and doesn't mean you can catch COVID-19 by going there now.
An outbreak means three or more people with COVID-19, who aren't close contacts, were in that place over the same 14-day period. So, those people may have never crossed pathsthey could have even been there on different days. And it's possible none of them caught the virus at the outbreak location. Being the site of an outbreak doesn't necessarily mean the businesses had unsafe practices.
The records reviewed by KPBS include all outbreak locations during the first nine months of the pandemic, but only specific case counts for the month of November. The November records show that most of the outbreaks are smallfewer than 10 casesand they dont reveal whether employees or patrons were infected.
But the overall records do show you're far more likely to be exposed to an outbreak based on your living circumstances and/or your behavior. For example:
At least 252 outbreaks occurred in nursing homes, jails, rehab facilities and shelters.
At least 136 outbreaks occurred in five lower income ZIP codes in East and South County, where many essential workers live.
At least 30 outbreaks have occurred at religious organizations since March. In November, outbreaks at houses of worship had a combined case count of at least 187, almost half of those coming from Awaken Church.
At least 86 outbreaks happened in the Pacific Beach and Gaslamp ZIP codes, two of the countys biggest party spots.
Seven casinos in the county have had outbreaks with a combined case count of more than 638.
This is the first time the public has seen this much outbreak data with this level of specificity for San Diego County. Since the onset of the pandemic, county officials have kept outbreak locations secret, instead only listing outbreaks by category such as "bar/restaurant" or "business."
The records obtained by KPBS represent a snapshot in time of an ever-changing dataset. Cases continue to increase at existing outbreak locations and new outbreaks pop up regularly, especially as the San Diego region is in the midst of a huge surge of COVID-19 cases.
County officials refused to comment for this story. But Greg Cox, the chairman of the county Board of Supervisors, sent a letter last week to KPBS General Manager Tom Karlo, urging him stop the publication of this story.
Editors note: This interactive map and searchable database contains records obtained by KPBS of COVID-19 community outbreaks in San Diego County. When viewing these records it is important to keep in mind that just because you visited a place that had an outbreak doesnt necessarily mean you were exposed to the virus. And it doesn't mean you can catch COVID-19 by going there now. By the countys definition, an outbreak occurs when three or more people with COVID-19, who aren't close contacts, were known to be in a specific location during the same 14-day period. It's possible none of them caught the virus at the outbreak location. And being the site of an outbreak doesn't necessarily mean the businesses had unsafe practices.COVID-19 is a virus that spreads easily without fear or favor. KPBS is releasing the outbreak locations because transparency and public health information is vital for our community.
In the past officials have said it is not important for the public to know detailed information about community outbreaks because they only account for about 4% of all COVID-19 cases in the county. The KPBS analysis of November outbreaks shows they accounted for about 8% of all cases during the month. Officials also argue that businesses and other organizations would not report outbreaks to the county if they were made public.
News organizations and other public interest groups have opposed the county, arguing that public health and the public interest is best served when people have the public health records of outbreak locations at their disposal.
In August, Voice of San Diego, KPBS and The San Diego Union-Tribune sued the county under the California Public Records Act for all of its outbreak location records. The news organizations have pointed out that other jurisdictions, including Los Angeles County and the state of Oregon, make their outbreak information public.
During an October hearing in the case, county lawyer John Cooley said the countys contact tracing program "would break down" if more detailed outbreak information were made public.
"Without voluntary disclosures, the county can't do the necessary contact tracing," Cooley said. "The county depends on voluntary disclosures to combat the pandemic here. There's no way for the county to find out if a mom and pop shop on El Cajon Boulevard had an outbreak if they don't disclose it."
However, businesses and other organizations would be breaking the law if they failed to report their outbreaks to the county.
Last month, a Superior Court judge ruled in favor of the county. KPBS and the other news organizations are appealing that decision.
How are outbreaks found?
A description on the countys website details how outbreaks are identified. It starts with contact tracing. When someone tests positive for COVID-19, they get a call from a case investigator.
"We interview all cases about their activities during the two weeks prior to their illness onset," the county's website says. "They may mention places they worked, shopped, visited, went to church, attended a gathering, etc."
If three people mention the same location within a 14 day period, it's labeled as an outbreak.
But Rebecca Fielding-Miller, an epidemiologist at UC San Diego, said given the current case surge, it would be extremely difficult for contact tracers to do all the detailed interviews required to accurately pinpoint the risk someone has of catching the virus in a specific location.
"If its nine staff members all working in the kitchen together and you have nine people test positive within a 14 day window, my initial assumption would be that those are connected," she said. "But if nine people report they happened to be in a Walmart in Chula Vista within a 14-day window because they were grocery shopping, youd have to narrow it down to a specific window, say they were all there between 2 and 5 pm on a Wednesday. And you cant do that when you have 2,000 cases a day."
Press play to see the number of outbreaks in San Diego County change from the start of the pandemic to the end of November.
Historically its made sense to trace outbreaks for sexually transmitted diseases, and for very rare diseases like measles, Fielding-Miller said. But with COVID-19, which is both highly contagious and widespread, tracing outbreaks isnt necessarily practical.
"It's like the wildfire analogy, where it can tell you where there are flare ups, which is useful when everything is not on fire," she said. "But when everything is on fire, its not as useful."
Fielding-Miller also said considering the context in the numbers obtained by KPBS is important. A higher number of outbreaks at retail chains is likely partly because they have multiple locations and more people work there and visit them.
"You wouldn't say Otay Mesa Detention Center has only had one outbreak and Dennys has had five, therefore Otay Mesa is safer," she said.
But there are also trends in the data that make sense with what else we know about COVID-19. There are multiple large outbreaks at retail centers like Walmart and Costco, and none at Whole Foods. That doesn't necessarily mean Whole Foods is saferit could be because lower-income people, who by virtue of their living situations are more vulnerable to COVID-19, are more likely to shop at the bigger retail chains, Fielding-Miller said.
She added that it's likely the outbreaks at restaurants and grocery stores are occurring between employees, because they spend more time in close proximity, but it's impossible to know because the county does not keep separate records for employees and customers.
Workers at risk
The records obtained by KPBS show how the pandemic has evolved throughout the year in San Diego County. During the spring, nursing homes and senior care facilities accounted for more than half the countys outbreaks. By November, even though case counts remain high in these facilities, they represented only 12% of new outbreaks for the month.
Meanwhile, 20% of the November outbreaks were in retail and grocery stores and 19% were in restaurants and bars. This means that an increasingly large number of workers are in establishments that have experienced outbreaks. Many say they are not being adequately protected.
Last month, workers at an AT&T call center in Sorrento Valley planned a walkout because they said 11 people had tested positive for COVID-19 and they didn't feel safe working there. But the employees said the county didnt inform them of the cases. Instead, Chris Roberts, the president of the local Communication Workers of America union, said they collect and notify union members of cases.
"If we weren't diligent in discovering the outbreak, no one would have known," Roberts said.
He said if the county publicly posted information about outbreaks at businesses, it would better protect workers. The county records obtained by KPBS do show an outbreak at that location, but with three cases, not 11.
"Family members want to know," Roberts said. "People want to be able to make decisions about whether to go to work, so people can make informed decisions."
In response to questions from KPBS, an AT&T spokesman said in an emailed statement that many employees work from home, but "some teams must report to an office due to the nature of the work that they perform." Those employees receive rapid testing and follow safety protocols, he said.
Workers at Costco are "very afraid" of contracting the virus, said Jaime Vasquez, the secretary-treasurer of the Teamsters Local 542, which represents some of the region's Costco employees. The records obtained by KPBS show 132 cases tied to 16 different outbreaks since the beginning of March.
When the pandemic first hit, Costco "did a fabulous job, they limited entrance to 600 people including staff," he said. Vasquez said the stores are allowing half capacity, which can still feel packed, "especially with Christmas shopping." Vasquez argues Costco is a retail store, which he said means it should be limited to 20% of its max capacity.
Costco did not respond to a request for comment. Other big retailers, such as Walmart, Target and Home Depot, sent statements to KPBS saying they prioritized safety and have taken extra measures during the pandemic.
A spokeswoman for Target acknowledged having multiple cases among employees at some of its stores. The records obtained by KPBS show 95 cases tied to 10 outbreaks at Target stores in San Diego County.
"Were paying these team members while theyre on leave and our thoughts are with them during this challenging time," the spokeswoman said in a statement. "After learning about positive cases, we also work quickly to deep clean and sanitize the store, which is the recommendation of public health experts and is in addition to the frequent disinfecting and cleaning we do at stores throughout each day. We notify the entire store team and provide them with the appropriate CDC guidance."
At Walmart, as well as at other big box retailers, store policy is to do temperature checks and health screenings on employees, have plexiglass barriers at checkout and limit store capacities to 20%.
"During this challenging time were working to balance health and safety concerns while still meeting the needs and expectations of our customers and associates," a Walmart spokeswoman said in a statement.
Devon Hannagan, who works as a supervisor at Vons on Balboa Avenue, said he would like more information on outbreaks at businesses. "Every man and woman who works for a company should be able to evaluate their own risk and come up with an idea of what's too much," he said.
San Diego County's health order says when an employee tests positive for COVID-19, the employer must notify "any employees, and contractors (who regularly work at the workplace), who may have been exposed."
Next month, the state will begin posting some data about employees who've been exposed, but without naming specific locations.
Unequal treatment
Certain businesses, including gyms and salons, have faced some of the most severe restrictions from the stay-at-home order while having relatively few outbreaks. Gyms had 14 outbreaks total since March, and salons and barber shops only had 10, according to the records obtained by KPBS.
Bryan Welch, general manager at Point Loma Sports Club, said he wishes the county could close businesses based on business practices and safety, not categories.
"I wish I could wave a magic wand to say each business gets evaluated on its merits, but then you would have to have 10,000 people working for the county going out to each business," he said.
The number of outbreaks at restaurants surged to 46 in July after dining was reopened, including indoors. But then the number fell to 18 for August after dining was restricted to outdoors. The number of restaurant outbreaks gradually increased through the fall, and rose to 60 in November, according to the numbers KPBS obtained.
Last week, a San Diego Superior Court Judge ruled that businesses "with restaurant service" could remain open. County officials at first said they would "suspend enforcement activities against restaurants and live entertainment establishments," prompting many restaurants to reopen, including for indoor dining. By Friday, an appeals court judge stayed the ruling, meaning restaurants had to close again, at least temporarily.
In addition, some businesses have refused to close or modify their operations to match county orders and have been served with cease and desist orders. Some businesses with more than one outbreak also have received cease and desist or closure letters, including El Prez and King and Queen Cantina.
San Diego County has argued in the past that revealing case numbers at businesses might let people decipher who has had COVID-19 at that business, which could be a privacy issue. But El Cajon City Manager Graham Mitchell called that argument "a cop out."
"I had it, there's no stigma around it, we dont shy away from telling people we had the flu or chickenpox," he said.
He said he thinks the county has pointed out categories with outbreaks to defend its decisions about what to close.
"That data point serves them because they have to defend the closure of bars and restaurants," he said. "But they cant play it both ways, cant use the numbers and then not reveal them."
KPBS obtained County Health Department records on the virus that have been withheld from the public, finally revealing where COVID-19 outbreaks have happened in San Diego County. Plus: Top county health officials detail vaccine rollout progress and future plans plus the ongoing legal battle impacting local restaurants and more local news you need.
Aired: December 21, 2020 | Transcript
If youve gone out at all since the pandemic first struck, you quite likely walked into a place where an outbreak occurred, according to the KPBS analysis of 1,006 outbreak records dating from March through the end of November.
Aired: December 21, 2020 | Transcript
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President-elect Joe Biden receives a COVID-19 vaccination Monday at the ChristianaCare Hospital in Newark, Del. Alex Edelman/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
President-elect Joe Biden receives a COVID-19 vaccination Monday at the ChristianaCare Hospital in Newark, Del.
Updated at 3:48 p.m. ET
President-elect Joe Biden publicly received his first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine on Monday as the death toll from the disease nears 320,000 in the United States.
Rolling up his sleeve at Christiana Hospital in Newark, Del., Biden told nurse practitioner Tabe Mase, "I'm ready!" and thanked her for her work with COVID-19 patients. "We owe you big, we really do," Biden said.
Biden said his wife, Jill, also received her first vaccine shot Monday.
"I'm doing this to demonstrate that people should be prepared when it's available, to take the vaccine. There's nothing to worry about," the president-elect said of his first vaccine dose. He said he was "looking forward" to getting the second dose.
"This is just the beginning. It's one thing to get the vaccine out, and now [vaccine-maker] Moderna is going to be on the road as well, but it's going to take time," he added, imploring Americans to continue following health guidelines, including wearing masks, keeping social distance and avoiding unnecessary travel.
The president-elect, who said the Trump administration "deserves credit" for getting the development and distribution of vaccines off the ground, has set a goal of distributing 100 million vaccine shots in the first 100 days of his administration.
In receiving the vaccine on Monday, the Bidens join a growing list of political leaders who are sharing videos or photos of themselves getting inoculated in an effort to boost public trust in the efficacy and safety of the vaccines that have been authorized for emergency use. The federal government has allotted vaccine doses to officials according to continuity of government protocols.
Vice President Pence, second lady Karen Pence and Surgeon General Jerome Adams were administered their initial vaccination shots during an on-camera event on Friday.
"Vaccines are how we beat this virus," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., tweeted on Friday after receiving his first shot.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., also shared photos of her vaccination, reminding the public to continue to follow social distancing guidelines and to wear masks as the vaccine is being distributed over the next several months.
Biden is 78, an age that puts him at higher risk of severe symptoms, should he contract the virus.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention panel on Sunday recommended that people over 75 be among the group prioritized next for a vaccine following health care workers and residents and workers at long-term care facilities.
Rep. Cedric Richmond of Louisiana, who will lead Biden's Office of Public Engagement, tested positive for the coronavirus last week. He did not have close contact with the president-elect before the positive test, an aide said.
According to a December NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist survey, 61% of Americans said they will take a vaccine when they are able to, up from 49% in September.
Among those most reluctant to get the vaccine are supporters of President Trump, people who live in rural areas and people without college degrees.
The White House has not said when Trump or first lady Melania Trump, both of whom were infected with the virus earlier this year, would receive the vaccine.
Vice President-elect Kamala Harris is expected to begin her course of vaccination next week.
