Mexico gives out first shots of Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine to health workers as government declares 'beginning of the end of that pandemic' that has killed more than 120,000 in the country
An intensive care nurse in Mexico City Thursday became the first person in Latin America to receive an approved coronavirus vaccine.
Mexico began administering the first 3,000 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in a broadcast ceremony in which MarÃa RamÃrez, 59, got the first shot.
The vaccination was broadcast live during President Andrés Manuel López Obrador's daily press briefing and under the watchful eyes of military personnel who escorted the vaccine shipment to Dr. Eduardo Liceaga General Hospital.
'This is the best present I could have received in 2020,' RamÃrez said. 'The truth is we are afraid, but we have to keep going because someone has to be in the front line of this battle.'
RamÃrez, a nurse at Rubén Leñero Hospital, volunteered to receive the shot, adding that 'we are afraid but we have to move on ... and I want to continue in the line of fire.'
Health worker Maria RamÃrez is the first person in Latin America to get vaccinated for COVID-19 at Dr. Eduardo Liceaga General Hospital in Mexico City on Thursday. The Mexican government received the first batches of vaccines produced by Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, on Wednesday
Medical workers stand outside Dr. Eduardo Liceaga General Hospital in Mexico City on Thursday as they wait to get vaccinated for COVID-19 while military forces stand guard. The first batches of vaccines produced by Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, arrived the previous day
Mexico's coronavirus response leader, Hugo López-Gatell, points to a vial of the COVID-19 vaccine during its first applications into health workers at Dr. Eduardo Liceaga General Hospital in Mexico City, on Thursday
A DHL cargo plane landed at Benito Juarez International Airport in Mexico City on Wednesday, approximately at 9am local time, with the vaccine shipment before Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard declared 'today is the beginning of the end of that pandemic.'
The COVID-19 vaccine shots were also given to medical personnel in the cities of Toluca and Queretaró.
Assistant Health Secretary Hugo López-Gatell waxed poetic, saying, 'Today the stage of the epidemic and its treatment changes, to a ray of hope.'
Zoé Robledo, director of Mexico's social security system, called it 'a forgettable Christmas. We are sure this is going to be the beginning of the end of the pandemic.'
Hospital workers watch fellow health workers get injected with the COVID-19 vaccinations at the Dr. Eduardo Liceaga General Hospital in Mexico City on Thursday
The first shipment of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine is unloaded from a DHL cargo plane at the Benito Juarez International Airport in Mexico City on Wednesday
Ebrard said Mexico was the first country in Latin America to get the vaccine.
According to the latest figures from John Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center, Mexico as of Thursday had generated 120,311 deaths, fourth-most in the globe and second in the region behind Brazil. Mexico has reported 1,350,079 confirmed cases during the pandemic.
Brazil, the epicenter of the virus in Latin America, has reported 189,220 deaths, second to the United States in the world, and third behind the U.S. and India with 7,365,517 positive cases.
Mexican officials held a press conference as the first shipment of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine to Mexico is pulled away (tip right) after being unloaded from a DHL cargo plane at Benito Juarez International Airport in Mexico City on Wednesday
Chile said it was receiving 10,000 doses on Thursday and Argentina, which has run into problems obtaining the Pfizer vaccine, received a flight carrying 300,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine, though it cannot yet be given to people older than 60 due to a lack of testing data.
Ebrard said about 53,000 more doses would arrive by next Tuesday, about 1.4 million doses in January and a total of about 11.75 million by mid-year.
Ebrard said two vaccines are currently undergoing Phase 3 studies in Mexico and another three are awaiting approval to start.
Other countries around the region are engaged in testing several vaccines, in studies that involve tens of thousands of volunteers.