A housekeeper at Upstate University Hospital was the first person in Central New York to be inoculated against COVID-19. 48-year-old Kenzo Mukendi cleans patient rooms in the COVID ward, and was one of about 50 front line workers expected to receive the Pfizer/BioNtech vaccine through Tuesday afternoon.
Syracuse University Assistant Professor of Public Health Brittany Kmush says it’s a remarkable culmination of scientific collaboration across academic, pharmaceutical, and technology settings.
"I think a lot of people don't really appreciate how much effort was needed to get this vaccine moving so quickly. I get a lot of people asking 'is this going to be a one-time thing, do we need to get it every year.' I have to say the only we know that for other vaccines is we follow people for several years after they've gotten the vaccine."
She says we’ll have to see how the novel coronavirus responds to increasing levels of immunity, and if it mutates.
"The flu is able to avoid the immune system every year by changing a little bit. That's why we need a new vaccine. We don't know exactly if the [novel] coronavirus is going to mutate. I think studies have shown that it doesn't mutate that quickly. So we have to learn more about how it evades the immune system."
While the vaccine provides a glimmer of hope, Kmush says there are examples of how the latest surge in infection could have been avoided.
"Life is almost back to normal in most of China. We look at New Zealand; they had a very intense lockdown for several weeks, and now life is back to normal. This [latest spike] was not inevitable. In the United States, we chose to prioritize businesses over humans, and this has then the spread that we see."
Meanwhile, she says it’s critical that everyone continue to maintain physical distancing and mask wearing for the next several months, until the vaccine is available to the general public. Kmush says messaging is also important so people understand that the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines have gone through extensive clinical trials and have strong safety profiles.
