EU launches vaccine rollout, historic day in virus fight

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Medical workers, nursing home residents and politicians are set to be vaccinated against the coronavirus across the European Union on Sunday, part of an effort by the bloc's 27 nations to roll out shots in a coordinated and equitable fashion.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen released a video celebrating the vaccine rollout, calling it “a touching moment of unity” in the battle to protect the bloc's nearly 450 million people from the worst public health crisis in a century.

As it turned out, some EU immunizations began a day early in Germany, Hungary and Slovakia. The operator of a German nursing home where dozens of people were vaccinated Saturday, including a 101-year-old woman, said “every day that we wait is one day too many.”

The rollout marks a moment of hope for a region that includes some of the world’s earliest and worst-hit virus hot spots — Italy and Spain — and others like the Czech Republic, which were spared earlier in the year only to see their health care systems near collapse in the fall. It also should ease frustrations that were building up, especially in Germany, as Britain, Canada and the United States kicked off their inoculation programs with the same vaccine weeks earlier.

Altogether, the EU’s 27 nations have recorded at least 16 million coronavirus infections and more than 336,000 deaths — huge numbers that experts still agree understate the true toll of the pandemic due to missed cases and limited testing.

The first shipments of the vaccine developed by Germany's BioNTech and American drugmaker Pfizer were limited to just under 10,000 doses in most EU countries, with its mass vaccination programs expected to begin only in January.

Each country is deciding on its own who will get the first shots. Spain, France and Germany, among...