A man is vaccinated at the Dr. Luis Alberto Erosa León Health Center, located in the Milpa Alta Mayor's Office.Nayeli Cruz
The wait has not appeased María Arreola's illusion of being one of the first Mexican citizens to receive the covid vaccine.
This 61-year-old woman has been part of a historic day: Mexico has started its mass vaccination program against the coronavirus this Monday.
Arreola has gone with her husband and sister-in-law to one of the centers that the Government of Mexico City has set up for immunization.
They arrived at six in the morning and have waited six hours to be attended.
Neither the cold of the early morning nor the itching of the midday sun have discouraged them.
"Receiving the vaccine gives us a lot of hope", he says, "there is a lot of covid around here, many well-known people have died."
The titanic operation of the Government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador to vaccinate 15 million older adults has been a bombshell of optimism in a country where the pandemic has left 1.9 million infections and more than 174,000 deaths.
After ten in the morning, everything seemed to be heading in the Mexican capital.
Escorted by a dozen agents from the National Guard and the Police, the refrigeration equipment containing the doses began to arrive at most of the vaccination points.
After immunizing some 620,000 health workers across the country in January, it was time for older adults.
The president's order was to prioritize the most remote areas.
This is what Mexico City did, which set up 70 makeshift centers in schools and clinics across three of the most remote delegations.
Each point was equipped with 500 vials to administer throughout the day.
About 2:30 p.m., more than 10,000 people had received the vaccine, according to the local government.
Anxiety and fear of falling due to covid turned the streets of Magdalena Contreras, one of the benefited areas, into long waiting rooms.
Barely a day had passed since the 870,000 AstraZeneca vaccines from India had landed when people began to gather at the door of Francisco Nicodemo Elementary School.
“What are you giving away here?” A man shouted as he passed the crowd.
“Vaccinations!”, A group that was waiting to be treated has happily responded.
The feeling that this injection is the beginning of the end of the pandemic in Mexico was planning the environment.
Candelaria, a 68-year-old neighbor, went with her husband at five in the morning.
After six hours in line, she gets excited when a few are left in front of her.
"I am a little afraid of the vaccine, but since I am diabetic and hypertensive, if the covid catches me, I do not know if I pass it," she says sitting on a chair that a neighbor has lent her.
Some 300 people behind her wait their turn for five blocks.
The process is slow.
Every ten minutes, some policemen standing at the door let one pass.
In an hour and a half they have only been able to vaccinate 31 people.
María Teresa Chávez leaves school already vaccinated.
“They have allowed me 15 minutes for observation after injecting the vaccine,” explains the 72-year-old woman in a wheelchair.
She feels good, and a little calmer now that she's been given the first dose.
Like her, many of those who are present have not even registered in the vaccination portal of the federal Administration.
On the contrary, a group of city government workers stopped by his house on Sunday to tell him that they were going to vaccinate people over 60 in his neighborhood.
“Whenever there are vaccination campaigns, I get vaccinated.
This was not going to be the exception, ”he laughs.
A government official from the capital city walks the five waiting blocks to tell people to prepare a piece of paper with their phone number, there they will notify you when they should return for the second dose.
David Segura did not believe in the coronavirus, but this Monday he went to be vaccinated with his wife.
This 69-year-old man went last year without wearing a mask, he was sure he was not going to catch it.
"When we began to see many cases of acquaintances, I was scared and I began to take care of myself," he says.
Now he is convinced that the way out of the pandemic comes from the hand of vaccines.
"If there is anything that can help us, it is this," he says.
About 500 meters from that school, the atmosphere at the Alfredo Uruchurtu school is similar.
There, the crowd of people who are going to be vaccinated mixes with those who are going to be tested for covid at a post set up by the city government.
Alejandra Cruz, 65, says that she has read in some media that the vaccine is not "totally safe", but her sister received it earlier in another neighborhood and is fine.
“You have to trust the authorities and if they say the vaccine is good, it is good.
There is not much else to do, ”he says with safety.
He talks and puts alcohol gel on his hands, afraid of catching it in the crowd, but prefers to stay and receive the injection "as a precaution."
The accumulation of people and the lack of distance between those who wait are some of the challenges posed by the mass vaccination operation.
That is why they have divided the beneficiaries who will be served throughout the week according to the letter with which the surname begins.
“It is not necessary to arrive very early to train.
There will be enough vaccines for everyone, "the city's head of government had requested on Twitter early this Monday.
Another challenge is keeping the tap for vaccines that arrive in Mexico open.
For Cruz, the idea that they could end was what led her to get vaccinated this Monday.
"Nobody wants to be without," he concludes.
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