Coronavirus vaccination begins with 6 health workers

Coronavirus vaccination began in Finland on Sunday afternoon with vaccination of six health workers of the front-line Intensive Care Unit (ICU), emergency department, and lung unit of the Helsinki University Hospital (HUS) district first, said the HUS in a press release.

The vaccination will continue and more health workers will get vaccines before the New Year, said the HUS.

The health workers working with the treatment of coronavirus patients and samples in the diagnostic centres will get the vaccine on a priority basis.

The vaccinated people will get a second dose of the vaccine after three weeks of the first dose.

“The vaccine takes four weeks to be fully effective from the first dose of the vaccination…,” said HUS Chief Administrative Officer Teppo Heikkilä.

HUS Deputy Chief Medical Officer Eeva Ruotsalainen said the vaccine will protect against the serious disease but it is important to follow all existing precautionary measures.

“It will take months after all people are vaccinated and achieve hard immunity until the epidemic is over,” said Ruotsalainen.

One of the first recipients of the vaccines, Deputy Nurse-in-Charge Kirsi Mustalammi said the injection was just normal, did not feel anything at all.

Earlier, on Saturday, the first batch of the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine arrived in Finland.

A total of 9,750 doses of vaccines arrived in the first batch and about 5,000 people will get the vaccine as it requires two doses.

The healthcare and social welfare workers, people above 70 years, and persons at high risk of contracting severe COVID-19 disease are on the priority list to get the vaccines, said the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health.

Municipalities are responsible for organising the vaccinations. The Finnish institute for Health and Welfare (THL) is responsible for delivering the vaccines to the municipalities and for providing them with expert assistance.

The vaccination data must be transmitted to the Finnish National Vaccination Register maintained by the THL in real time.