Pence, Top Congressional Leaders Receive COVID-19 Vaccine

Vice President Mike Pence and the House and Senate leaders have received their first doses of the COVID-19 vaccine on Friday.

It is part of their efforts to reassure the American public that the COVID-19 vaccine shot is safe to take, as reported by the Associated Press.

Pence celebrated the event and called the vaccine a "medical miracle" that could potentially put an end to an ongoing pandemic that has already killed more than 310,000 people in the United States.

President Donald Trump has not been present during the vaccination campaign activities.

In a televised appearance on Friday, Pence told the healthcare workers from the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center that he did not feel a thing. Pence's wife, Karen Pence, was also vaccinated.

"Today, Karen and I wanted to step forward and take this vaccine to assure the American people that while we cut red tape, we cut no corners. Hope is on the way," the vice president said.

Doctors advised the Pences to return after 21 days for the second dose of the vaccine. They also told the couple that they might feel some soreness around the injection site.

Pence became the first highest-ranking U.S. official to receive the Pfizer-BioNTech shot. The vaccine from Pfizer-BioNTech was the first one to get authorization in the U.S.

Top Officials Receiving the Vaccine

Aside from Pence, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell tweeted photos of themselves receiving the vaccine from the Capitol physician.

They then urged other members of Congress to join them. The regular public is still skeptical of the vaccinations to get them.

As a response, public displays of vaccination are being done by government and health officials to assure them that the vaccine is safe.

A survey from the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that only around half of Americans want to get the vaccine as soon as possible. A quarter of the public is not sure, and the remaining quarter said that they are not interested.

Others just do not approve of the vaccines in general, while others want to observe first how the campaign goes as they think the injections have been rushed.

The public has not heard from Trump about the country's vaccination rollout. He also has not said when he would be inoculated. The president was hospitalized for COVID-19 last October.

Trump had pushed aside the plans of his aides, who wanted him to be the public face of the vaccination program, said the people familiar with the conversations, as per an ABC News report.

Pence has been the one highlighting the safety and efficacy of the vaccines and touring around the production facility this week before doing Friday's event.

Lawrence Gostin, a professor at Georgetown Law that focuses on public health, said that Trump's invisibility during these efforts has been surprising.

The professor noted that Trump's relatively low profile on the COVID-19 response since the election is counter to the president's interest, as reported by Fox 23 News.

Gostin said Trump deserves credit for Operation Warp Speed and the two vaccines that use groundbreaking mRNA technology.

For exhibiting leadership in the vaccines' development, he noted that Trump "should take great pride in publicly demonstrating his trust in COVID vaccines."