Healthcare workers in Los Angeles have been starting to get coronavirus vaccinations.
KNX 1070 News talked to two who both got their shots today who dropped by via phone to talk about their experience taking the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine - the first vaccine approved by the FDA in the U.S.
Dr. Isabel Pedraza, the Director of the Medical Intensive Care Unit at Cedars-Sinai, and Jeremy Glekas, an Emergency Room registered nurse at Kaiser Permanente West Los Angeles Medical Center, spoke to Mike Simpson and Karen Adams.
Pedraza says "I have felt great actually. I was fully expecting to have some pain in my arm but even that, but no. I've done really well."
She said she hasn't able to stop smiling since she got her vaccination. "It's the first time, I think, that a lot of us have felt any hope since the beginning of this. I am pretty elated," she says.
Meanwhile, Glekas also said "I feel great!" He got his vaccine today.
"We see a glimpse of a finish line," he says.
Both went on to say how they welcomed the vaccine even as others in SoCal and around the country are balking or do not want to take it.
California is getting more than 300,000 doses initially.
Earlier this week as shipments of the Pfizer vaccine made their way to Southern California, the first ICU nurse at Kaiser Permanente in Hollywood was administered the first dose of the Pfizer vaccine in SoCal. Large LA County hospitals received the first doses of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine. Locally, UCLA Health and Cedars-Sinai will get some of the first supplies over the next couple of days.
Earlier this week, Orange County also administered the first COVID-19 vaccine to its healthcare workers. The vaccine has a 95 percent effective rate at treating the virus.
Meanwhile on Thursday the ICU capacity in the Southern California region went down to zero. The state's figure, for the 11 county region, doesn't mean there are no ICU beds left.
The number of available ICU beds in LA County has been hovering around 100.