In this week’s Government press conference, held on Monday January 18th, among other issues the Hon. Premier and Minister of Health sought to inform the general public about matters pertaining to the COVID-19 vaccine which, he said, should be arriving in Anguilla, from the UK, by the second week in February.
As it is in other countries around the globe, in Anguilla there is some skepticism and apprehension about the safety of the inoculation which is meant to provide immunity from the infectious coronavirus. Both the Hon. Premier and the Hon. Minister of Tourism have set out to allay any fears.
“The United Kingdom Government informed us that it would supply us with COVID-19 vaccines, and we are indeed thankful for that,” the Premier stated. “At this point there are basically three vaccines that are approved. They are the Pfizer BioNTech, Moderna and Astra-Zeneca.”
“The Pfizer vaccine requires cold chain storage of -70 degrees Celsius,” the Premier noted. “Anguilla would not be able to store that. The Moderna vaccine, on the other hand, requires cold storage of -20 degrees Celsius. We can store that, but to get it from the UK here, without direct flights, poses another issue of having it passing through a third country. Therefore, we opt for the Astra-Zeneca vaccine which requires temperatures of only -2 to -8 degrees Celcius. We can get that one shipped in, and easily maintain its cold chain so that it stays preserved.”
The Premier said that the first batch of vaccines will consist of 7,500 doses, and a second batch of 7,500 will be shipped a couple of weeks after, since the Astra-Zeneca requires that two doses be administered for total immunity — just as Pfizer and Moderna. He explained that the second dose would be administered between two to four weeks after the first dose.
“We will start by administering doses to frontline healthcare workers,” the Premier stated. “They will be followed by border control personnel such as immigration, customs and police officers, as well as firefighters. Next in line will be hospitality workers, followed by those in elderly care centres, and then the general population will be inoculated. We will only vaccinate persons eighteen years and older, and we will not be vaccinating pregnant women.”
With regard to the priority list, a question was asked as to whether Government officials would be willing to take the vaccine first as a demonstrative example to the general population — in a show of confidence.
The Premier answered: “That is a good question. As I have said sometime before, the Permanent Secretary of Health and I, as Minister of Health, will be the first and second to get vaccinated. The other ministers and Government officials have also accepted to be in that first tier. We do consider ourselves to be frontline.” Later, the Minister of Tourism, Mr. Haydn Hughes, boldly vouched: “Well, history is always made, and someone has to be first. So, I would like to make history by being the first. Then in a rather humorous, yet affirmative, tone he boldly touted: “I would want to have history record that Haydn Austin Fortè Hughes was the first person to be vaccinated in Anguilla against COVID-19 infections.”
In a more serious tone, the Premier stressed that getting the vaccination will not be mandatory, but he will encourage all eligible persons to take it, since doing so will help us to get closer to a sense of normalcy. He observed: “Until we get over 70% of the population vaccinated, we would still have to be doing quarantines when persons visit Anguilla. Through vaccination, we need to get to a certain level of immunity where the risk of persons becoming infected by visitors is lowered.”
– Staff Reporter, James R. Harrigan
