Senior receives first Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine in U.K.

An 82-year-old man is the first person in the U.K. to receive the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine.

“The vaccine means everything to me,” said Brian Pinker. “To my mind, it’s the only way I’m getting back to a bit of normal life.”

Since Dec. 8, Britain’s National Health Service has been using a vaccine made by Pfizer and BioNTech to inoculate health care workers and nursing home residents and staff.

The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine boosts that medical arsenal and is cheaper and easier to use since it does not require the super-cold storage needed by the Pfizer vaccine.

More than a million doses of this vaccine are available today, with tens of millions more to be delivered in the coming weeks.

The shot is being administered at a small number of U.K. hospitals for the first few days so authorities can watch out for any adverse reactions.

But hundreds of new vaccination sites, at both hospitals as well as local doctors’ offices,  will launch this week, joining the more than 700 already in operation, NHS England said.