Yellowstone Public Radio
A St. Vincent Healthcare worker loads up a syringe with the vaccine on Dec. 16, 2020.
The two large hospital systems in Billings are busy administering nearly 2,000 COVID-19 vaccines this week. The first jabs were met with joy and celebration.
Hundreds of St. Vincent Healthcare frontline workers and a handful of Billings Clinic workers received the Pfizer vaccine on Dec. 15.
Emergency medicine physician Douglas Parker is the first up at St. Vincent’s.
He holds up the dark blue sleeve of his scrubs and a nurse sticks his upper arm in front of a group of excited onlookers.
“Wait, when are you going to give me the shot? I didn’t feel it. You sure? Okay, Parker says.
Vaccines administered at St Vincent and Billings Clinic kulr8.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from kulr8.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Frontline workers were the first in Yellowstone County to receive Pfizer s COVID-19 vaccine.
Jason Banfield, a paramedic with the Billings Fire Department, rubbed his shoulder and appeared to smile behind his mask. I feel fine, he said.Â
Banfield was one of a handful of health care workers at Billings two hospitals who were the first in town to receive the new COVID-19 vaccine, which got FDA approval on Friday and arrived in the state on Monday.
Shots were administered first at Billings Clinic at noon on Tuesday; St. Vincent Healthcare began administering its shots shortly before 2 p.m. at its Mansfield Center. Staff had divided one of the center s conference rooms into bays where individual frontline hospital staff received their vaccine shots.