BOZEMAN — There was excitement at Bozeman Health Deaconess Hospital on Monday as the first doses of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine officially arrived.
The hospital received 975 doses, and the first six people in Bozeman to get the vaccine are all healthcare workers at Bozeman Health.
A couple of different factors went into selecting the first six.
“There were just a couple of different ways. One was the degree of exposure to patients with Covid-19, people who are working in areas who see a high frequency of infected patients,” explained one of the healthcare officials with the hospital.
So how did they feel right after the shot?
“Great, no different. It’s easier than the flu vaccine. Definitely less painful, yeah,” the group responded.
Emotions ran high throughout the building as everyone seemed inspired that this could be a turning point in the fight against the virus.
“Hopeful that we’re on our way to society getting back to some normalization,” said one of the vaccine recipients.
But officials did send a warning that there’s still a long road ahead, including continuing current practices.
“We still have a long way to go, and as he mentioned, masks and social distancing and PPE’s we use, and all the measures remain just as important as they were before this,” another healthcare official explained.
The next shipments are expected to arrive at the hospital on a routine basis.
“We’re expecting to get them in one week intervals. So, the next delivery to this community will probably be the Moderna vaccine and additional Pfizer vaccines,” an official with the hospital explained.
The hospital said that they think it will take until the end of this month to get all their healthcare workers out the way, and then they can start focusing on the general public.