JOSEPH KANTER: A milestone in the history of the coronavirus pandemic. This morning, the Pfizer vaccine is in several people in the United Kingdom. That's right. Step one in a global immunization program is now underway, as the U.K. rolled out the first doses of the clinically approved vaccine. First up was 90-year-old Margaret Keenan.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: You're part of a moment of history. You're supposed to receive this vaccine. How does that feel?
MARGARET KEENAN: It hasn't sunk in yet (laughter). I don't - I can't really answer that question yet. It's just really - I don't know what to say. It's just overwhelming, as the first, really.
DAVID GREENE, HOST:
Overwhelming, she said there. So with the FDA expected to authorize the use of a first COVID vaccine here in the U.S. as early as this week, how are states across this country gearing up for a rollout? Louisiana is already thinking about this and making its plans, and here to talk about that state and how it's preparing, Dr. Joseph Kanter. He's the interim assistant secretary of the Louisiana Health Department's Office of Public Health. Dr. Kanter, thank you for being here.
KANTER: Thank you, David. It's nice to be with you.
GREENE: As you listened to that moment in Britain, how are you reflecting on this?
KANTER: It's simply remarkable. I think this is the greatest scientific achievement of our lifetime. I mean, 12 months ago, we didn't even know the virus existed. This is truly, truly remarkable. And look - every person that gets vaccinated, we are looking at as a potential life saved. That's the urgency that we need to be approaching this moment right now.
GREENE: What can you tell people who live in your state, in Louisiana - how soon do you think at least some people can expect to start getting their first doses?
KANTER: Oh, I think within a week or two, you know. Within 24 hours of the FDA granting emergency authorization, this product will be shipped. And we've been preparing for months now. We're ready to go. And we're anxious. You know, people are suffering. And make no mistake - this is the offramp. This is how we get out of the pandemic. And we're going to make sure that not a single drop is wasted.
GREENE: Well, how are you going to do that? How is this actually going to be done? Where are people going to get injected? Are you going to have drive-through stations? Is it going to feel similar to testing sites that many of us have become familiar with?
KANTER: I think down the road, when we get into more general population-type administrations, that's what it will look like. Before that, you know, our phase 1A, the top of the top in terms of priority, looks very similar - you know, frankly, identical - to what the ACIP committee has advised the CDC and the rest of the country to do. And that's front-line hospital and health care personnel and residents and staff of long-term care facilities.
So we will be directing the Pfizer vaccine - which, as you mentioned, we should get within a week or two - towards hospital and health care personnel. That means they'll be distributed directly to hospitals and administered on site. So not the type of drive-through settings yet, although we think those are coming down the road. Hospitals are ready. We actually drilled, end to end, the whole scheme a couple of weeks ago. We did it on a weekend to make sure that folks were ready to receive, even on a weekend. And all in all, that exercise went fairly smoothly.
GREENE: Oh, wow. You ran a whole drill over the weekend to make sure this was all set in place and ready to go.
KANTER: Absolutely. Dummy vaccine, end-to-end temperature monitoring. You know, a couple of snags here and there, but by and large, the packages arrived when they were supposed to. People were ready to accept them, ready to administer. And we felt confident that when it comes - and we don't know the exact date - but when it does come, we'll be ready. And I do think most every other state will be ready as well.
GREENE: Do you know, like, how many people you'll be able to vaccinate in the initial phase and how many people might be in the phase after that? Like, what kind of numbers are you talking about?
KANTER: We're expecting to get 39,000 doses in the first week's shipment that will start a weekly cadence. And we'll get something in that ballpark every week going forward for the Pfizer vaccine. No product is going to sit on the shelf. It's either going to be delivered directly to our hospitals - for our larger ones, for our smaller hospitals. We'll receive it centrally in Louisiana, subdivided, subdistributed, all under the ultracold requirements and then get it out.
You know, once this product leaves ultracold, you have five days to administer it. So we will not be hoarding or putting any product on the shelf. It will be administered very, very quickly. So it's realistic to think that within 24 hours of this product being authorized, it ships, and then it's going into people's arms a day or two after that.
GREENE: That's amazing. Is it hard to be excited about this when you have, you know, so many hospitalizations right now and the surge that's happening, you know, in so many parts of the country?
KANTER: You know, that's the messaging challenge right now because, on one hand, this is the offramp; this is how the pandemic ends. The end is in sight, and that's incredibly exciting. I really am excited and encouraged by it. The challenge here is, you know, we still got to keep our eyes on the road. And, you know, they say the majority of car accidents happen within a couple miles of your house. We have a treacherous road ahead, as you mentioned. We've got to do all the things that keep us safe and continue to do those until we have enough vaccine for everyone, which probably is not happening until the summertime.
GREENE: Dr. Joseph Kanter, interim assistant secretary of the Louisiana Health Department's Office of Public Health. Dr. Kanter, thank you.
KANTER: My pleasure, David. Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
