First doses of COVID-19 vaccines arrive in Seattle
KOMO News Staff
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SEATTLE -- The first 3,900 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine arrived in Seattle Monday morning, the first of thousands of doses on the way to our state as we hope to turn the corner against the raging pandemic.
Four boxes of the recently-approved Pfizer vaccine arrived packed in dry ice at the University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle.
Each box carries 195 vials; each vial contains enough vaccine for five doses for a total of 975 doses per box.
"So we're going to take one box out and it's going to go here (at University of Washington Medical Center) and it's going to be loaded into our ultra cold freezer," said Steve Fijalka, UW Medical Center Chief Pharmacy Officer, as they opened their inaugural vaccine shipment in front of news cameras and carefully placed the box inside the freezer at -78 degrees C. "Then we're going to go deliver to our other three hospital sites: Northwest, Harborview and Valley (Medical Center)."