Black New York Nurse Among First to Receive COVID-19 Vaccine

A New York City ICU nurse became the first New Yorker, and possibly the first American, to receive an authorized coronavirus vaccine Monday.
At a virtual press briefing, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo introduced the historic recipient, Sandra Lindsay, who works at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in Queens.
Shipments of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, which was authorized by the Food and Drug Administration on December 11, began arriving at hospitals over the weekend, and frontline health care workers began receiving them Monday.
“I have no fear,” Lindsay told CNN later in the day. “I trust the science. My profession is deeply rooted in science. I trust science. What I don’t trust is getting COVID-19, because I don’t know how it will affect me and the people around me that I could potentially transfer the virus to.”

Born in Jamaica, the 52-year-old Lindsay immigrated to the U.S. in 1986. She is a nurse who has been working with COVID-19 patients at the Long Island Jewish Medical Center. She received an ovation from health officials and others who gathered to watch the injection, which was administered by Dr. Michelle Chester.

Chester is the corporate director of employee health services at Northwell Health, a regional hospital system has seen over 100,000 patients with COVID-19.

 Yahoo News and CNN News contributed to this report.