화이자 백신 영국 속속 도착…최초 대량접종 전 세계 주시... 영국 여왕도 접종

All eyes are on the UK as it gets ready to launch the national COVID-19 inoculation program.
Over in the U.S., media reports say, President-elect Joe Biden has picked California Attorney General Xavier Becerra to be his health secretary and lead his administration's pandemic response.
Han Seong-woo reports.
The COVID-19 vaccine, created by American pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and Germany's BioNTech, has arrived in the UK from Belgium where it was manufactured.
It will be quality-checked before being administered at 50 hospitals in England and then at more than 1-thousand health clinics across the U.K.
Britain has ordered a total of 40 million doses, enough to vaccinate 20 million people in a country of 67 million... with two doses required per person.
"It's... it's just incredible actually. Obviously I can't hold them in my hands because they are minus 70 degrees but to know that they are here and we are amongst the first in the country to actually receive the vaccine and therefore the first in the world is just amazing. I am so proud."
The first doses are set to be administered on Tuesday, local time, with the National Health Service prioritizing those aged 80 or over, frontline healthcare workers and nursing home staff and residents.
Media sources say Queen Elizabeth the second and her husband Prince Philip are to be vaccinated within weeks.
Britain recently approved emergency use of the vaccine, jumping ahead in the global race.
In the U.S., according to the New York Times, President-elect Joe Biden is set to nominate California Attorney General Xavier Becerra for Secretary of Health and Human Services.
If confirmed by the Senate, Becerra will play a critical role in the Biden Administration tackling a pandemic which has claimed more than 280-thousand lives in America.
The Times also reports that chief of infectious diseases at Massachusetts General Hospital, Dr. Rochelle Walensky will be chosen to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Han Seong-woo, Arirang News.