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All residents at an East Belfast care home have been vaccinated against Covid-19.<\/p>\nAll residents at an East Belfast care home have been vaccinated against Covid-19.<\/p>\n
A person aged 100 was among 25 vulnerable occupants and 35 staff to receive the jab at a home which specializes in supporting those with dementia.<\/p>\n
Palmerston manager Paul Johnston had around 24 hours notice that a mobile vaccination team of health workers would be arriving on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
He said: \u201cWe are very pleased to be the first care home in Northern Ireland to be included in the Covid-19 vaccination program.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis has been an incredibly tough year for the care home sector and it is great to be able to end it on a hopeful note.\u201d<\/p>\n
‘Huge moment’
\nThe first person to receive the Covid-19 vaccine in Northern Ireland earlier said it felt like a \u201chuge moment\u201d in the battle against the pandemic.<\/p>\n
Joanna Sloan, 28, is sister in charge of the team of vaccinators for the Belfast Health and Social Care Trust, Northern Ireland\u2019s largest.<\/p>\n
She received the jab at the Royal Victoria Hospital in West Belfast shortly after 8am on Tuesday morning, and said it felt like she had cleared the final hurdle.<\/p>\n
The nurse, from Dundrum in Co Down, said: \u201cI feel privileged and honored and a little bit emotional that we have got here \u2013 very, very grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n
She felt \u201capprehensive and nervous\u201d beforehand. As the vaccine was administered, she said she was thinking: \u201cAt last \u2013 we are here.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Royal Victoria Hospital\u2019s center for delivering the vaccine is a former storage facility which was converted into a clinical environment within a week. Staff worked \u201caround the clock\u201d to prepare, Ms Sloan added.<\/p>\n
She said her daughter, Cailie, was at school and hoped she would be proud to learn that her mother was the first to receive the jab in Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n
Afterwards, she said of the jab: \u201cIt did not feel any different than any other immunization that I have had, I did not feel any pain.\u201d<\/p>\n
Northern Ireland\u2019s chief medical officer, Dr Michael McBride, said it was a remarkable day.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can begin to look to the future with a degree of optimism, with this vaccine and other vaccines and more effective treatments,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully in the future Covid-19 will become a more manageable disease and we will begin the pathway to a more normal life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dr McBride added that he did not think this day would come so soon, 10 months after Covid-19 was discovered, as opposed to the more normal 10 years taken to develop vaccines.<\/p>\n