Canada will see the first shipments of a COVID-19 vaccine this month.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the first 249,000 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine candidate will be shipped as early as next week pending Health Canada approval. According to Trudeau, the agency is working around the clock and reassured Canadians that any vaccine approved in Canada will be safe and effective. Approval is expected any day now.
Last week the government said it was not expecting a shipment of the vaccine until early in the New Year. Trudeau said millions more doses of both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines will be coming early in 2021. The PM said the federal government faces its largest immunization in the countries’ history and is “no small task.”
There have been 14 vaccination sites identified in large urban areas where the vaccine can be shipped and stored at the required sub-zero temperatures.
