By TOMMY REZAC
St. Joseph Post
It's a day that everyone at Mosaic Life Care had been longing for since March - their first doses of a COVID-19 vaccine.
Roughly 40 frontline workers at Mosaic Life Care in St. Joseph received the first doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine on Tuesday. Mosaic received 975 doses of the Pfizer vaccine and 1500 of the Moderna vaccine - the amount it requested. Vaccinations will also take place at Mosaic in Maryville and Albany.
Rowell Gutierrez is a registered nurse at Mosaic in St. Joseph. He arrived from the Philippines this past February and started treating COVID patients in March. Some of Gutierrez's patients have passed away due to virus complications, but he's confident that this vaccine will help end this long battle.
"After taking this vaccine, I hope it will help," Gutierrez said, "and also convince other people, not just in St. Joseph, just to know that this might help us put an end to this chaos."
Aryn Fidler is an ICU nurse, and has seen the very worst that COVID has to offer. For her, receiving the vaccine was a major relief.
"I want things to go back to normal," she said empathically. "I don't want to watch any more people die. I see horrible, horrible things happen to wonderful, perfectly healthy people...I'm tired of it."
Mosaic Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Davin Turner, called this a 'joyous time' and wants everyone to know that there is no reason to fear this vaccine.
"I believe this vaccine is safe," Turner said. "That's why I wanted to sit there and show people that it's safe and I'm certainly willing to have the vaccine and be an example for folks. We need to be vaccinated. This is how the country gets back to some sense of normalcy."
Turner said up to 200 workers will receive their vaccine Wednesday, and he believes everyone within the Mosaic system will be vaccinated within 14 days.
Mike Morgan works as a runner at Mosaic in St. Joseph, delivering supplies to various parts of the hospital. He said his shot Tuesday was painless, and he's grateful to all who helped get this vaccine out so quickly.
"This thing has gone full speed," Morgan said. "(The U.S. government) called this (Operation) Warp Speed. This is warp speed. Here we are. Hopefully, this is going to take care of it."
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