90 year old Margaret Keenan, the first patient in the UK to receive the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, administered by nurse May Parsons at University Hospital, Coventry, England, Tuesday Dec. 8, 2020. The U.K. is the first Western country to deliver a broadly tested and independently reviewed vaccine to the general public. Documents released by U.S. regulators Tuesday confirmed that Pfizer’s vaccine was strongly protective against COVID-19 and appeared safe. Authorities are focusing on large-scale distribution points because each package of vaccine contains 975 doses and they don’t want any to be wasted. The U.K. has agreed to buy more than 350 million doses from seven different producers.

(Yui Mok/Pool Photo via AP)LONDON – It’s been dubbed “V-Day” in Britain -- recalling the D-Day landings in France that marked the start of the final push in World War II to defeat Nazi Germany. In other words, the National Health Service is saying to the waiting public, in effect: Don't call us, we'll call you. Most people will have to wait until next year before there is enough vaccine on hand to expand the program. “I don’t think people should expect anything over the next few days because the reality is … that for the vast, vast, vast majority of people this will be done in January, February, March,″ said Chris Hopson, chief executive of NHS Providers. The first shipments of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine were delivered to a selected group of U.K. hospitals on Sunday.

Last week, the U.K. became the first country to authorize the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine for emergency use. Governments and health agencies around the world will be monitoring the British vaccination program, which will take months, to note its successes and failures and adjust their own plans accordingly. The U.K. has secured 40 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine, which can cover 20 million people. Since the British government will only immunize people over 16, around 55 million people in the U.K. will be eligible. Public Health England has secured 58 special Twin Guard ultra-low temperature freezers that provide sufficient storage for approximately five million doses.