First Person Receives Coronavirus Test Vaccine

The first person in the world to receive a coronavirus test vaccine was Jennifer Haller. She is from Seattle, Washington and is a mother of two children. Ms. Haller is a healthy patient, and this was an experimental, potential vaccine for COVID-19. She received the shot today, Monday, April 13, 2020, at the Kaiser Permanente Washington Research Institute in Seattle. “We all feel so helpless. This is an amazing opportunity for me to do something,” Haller said of the occasion. Even though Jennifer Haller was eager to receive the vaccine, her husband, relatives, and friends expressed serious concerns while she underwent a series of medical tests to be approved for the trial. Haller described her reaction to the vaccine as follows: “The first day I had a slightly elevated temperature. The second day my arm was pretty sore. But that was it — everything was all right after that. It was as easy as a regular flu shot.”

There were three other participants that joined Haller who were in line for the first of two doses of the vaccine, of which will be administered one month apart. There are expected to be forty-five volunteers who will participate in the study needed to prove that the vaccine (code-named mRNA-1273) is safe and that it could work. Also worth noting is that the participants will not receive any part of the novel virus itself in the vaccine, of which the results have been promising after being tested on animals.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, made light of the new study saying, “[it] launched in record speed, is an important first step toward achieving that goal.” However, one of the biggest takeaways from the experiment is that even if the trial is successful, the vaccine will most likely not be available for use by the general public for 12 to 18 months, according to Dr. Fauci.