UW Health employees to receive vaccine Monday afternoon

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MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Health care workers in Wisconsin will start receiving the COVID-19 vaccine on Monday as hospitals begin receiving shipments of the vaccine.

UW Health said in a statement that it had received its first doses, which were transported in ultra-cold storage freezers and stored for distribution. The first employees were to start receiving the shots on Monday afternoon, UW Health said.

It wasn’t immediately clear if they would be the first people in Wisconsin to receive the vaccine, but no one else had announced plans to deliver it any sooner. State health officials planned to announce an update on distribution on Monday afternoon.

UW Health is the health system of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and has more than 1,750 doctors and 21,000 staff at seven hospitals and more than 80 outpatient sites, according to its website.

Shipments of precious frozen vials of vaccine made by Pfizer Inc. and its German partner BioNTech began arriving at hospitals around the country Monday.

The vaccine arrives in Wisconsin following a weekend where deaths from the coronavirus topped 4,000 and total cases were about 436,000.

Wisconsin expected to receive about 65,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine this week and next. Widespread vaccination for the general population isn’t expected for months.