UF Health Jacksonville to distribute more vaccines today

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — One hundred health care workers at UF Health Jacksonville will be receiving the COVID-19 Pfizer vaccine today.

Yesterday, 10 people received the vaccine at the hospital., including pharmacist Ben Bato.

Bato was the fifth person to get a vaccine. He was This morning he told Jacksonville’s Morning News that he was feeling fine.

“The only thing I’m really feeling is pain at the injection site, it’s just really some mild pain that, in my opinion, is kind of similar to when you get the flu shot,” Bato said.

Bato said that his co-workers have working tirelessly during this pandemic, and this vaccine gives him hope.

“So I was able to review some of the article that was actually released from the New England Journal of Medicine last week, and just looking at the safety profile and the efficacy, it looks looks very favorable,” Bato said. “So I would encourage everyone to get the vaccine because anyone infected with COVID-19 for their friends and family. It’s a very, very devastating disease for the poor, for everyone in the whole country and the world.”

However, just because the vaccine is here, doesn’t mean all is solved. The vaccine is coming out slowly and is only available to healthcare workers at the moment in Florida. Later this month, there will be a plan to distribute vaccines to long-term care facilities.

The vaccine is going to take some time, so hopefully down the road, maybe a year down the line, hopefully we’ll be able to eradicate the disease and protect everybody from this from the virus,” Bato said.

For now though, Bato is one of the few in the country to have gotten a vaccine. He received a “I Got a COVID-19” sticker after his shot. Bato says that this sticker will be put in a scrapbook.

This morning 10,000 doses arrived at UF Health Jacksonville. 100 vaccines will be given out today and the plan is to distribute 500 vaccines tomorrow.

Cox Media Group