According to the American National Public Radio, the Delta variant of COVID-19 could be as contagious as chicken pox, one of the more transmissible viruses , and could spread more easily than the common cold, the 1918 flu, and small pox. Fortunately, changes or mutations in the virus are expected not to make vaccines completely ineffective. Hence, it’s now time for us to work together to stop the virus from widely circulating in a population and increasing the chances of the virus mutating.
I had ended up in a hospital bed a few times because of pneumonia, which is an infection of the lungs. It’s not a great experience lying on the hospital bed for weeks to receive treatments. Meanwhile, the COVID-19 infection can also progress to our lungs and thus it’s possible to develop pneumonia because of COVID-19 infection. So before it’s too late, I shall have the vaccination done.
Nominated
As a staff working in National University of Singapore, I was nominated to received the COVID-19 vaccination in early June 2021. Hence, I don’t need to go through the registration process and can directly book the vaccination day.
We are allowed to choose a vaccination centre. Once it’s chosen, we cannot change the vaccination centre to another one after the 1st dose. The one I picked is located at Raffles City Convention Centre which offered Pfizer vaccines.
Preparation
I tried to rest as much as I could few days before the vaccination day. It’s also important to drink lots of water to maintain the body hydration level. I normally drank about 2 liters of plain water per day. On top of that, since the weather in Singapore was extremely warm in July, starting from three days before my vaccination day, I also bought a cup of coconut water every day. The nutrients and antioxidant properties of coconut water make it a good substitute for saline or glucose drinks and thus help those who are feeling feverish after vaccination, according to Dr Abdul Bashir, senior resident doctor at Thomson 24-hour Family Clinic.
On the day of vaccination, I also brought my NRIC and a bag with a bottle of plain water inside. We will be receiving vaccination information sheet and other documents after the vaccination, so it’s better to bring a bag to keep them safe.
Vaccination
The timeslot I booked for the vaccination is at 3pm. The queue was rather short. I had only queued for 15 minutes. During this period of time, the staff in the vaccination centre checked with each of us, the vaccination recipients, about the health conditions to see whether we have following issues such as
- ARI Symptoms;
- Fever in the past 24 hours;
- Other vaccines taken in past 14 days;
- Cancer treatment;
- Blood thinning;
- Organ transplant;
- Infected by COVID before;
- Pregnant;
- Reaction after 1st dose (for those who are taking 2nd dose).
If there are no serious issues, we will then be allowed to proceed to get vaccinated.
The actual vaccination took less than one minute. After that, we are brought to the observation area.
Observation
The observation area is for us to sit on a chair and wait for 30 minutes to see whether any negative reaction occurs. There was also audio announcement in the observation area in four languages, i.e. English, Chinese, Bahasa Melayu, and Tamil. The announcement is important because it gives us advises on what to do after the vaccination and having severe allergic reaction.
In order to kill time and destress, many of the vaccination recipients chose to read articles or watch videos on their smartphone. Hence, sometimes when the staff called their name to let them know the waiting time was over, they were still sitting there.
After 30 minutes of observation, the staff called my name and passed me a vaccination card. The vaccination card is the most important document throughout the vaccination journey because we need to bring the card for the 2nd dose.
After Vaccination
First of all, no fever.
I could feel a bit pain in the area of injection on my left arm when I lifted it upward in the first four days after the vaccination. I also avoided sleeping on left side because that would give pressure to my left arm and that would be a bit painful. Other than these minor issues, basically I had not encountered any side effect.
Yup, that’s all of my vaccination journey. Let’s discuss again when I have the 2nd dose.
Together, we live healthier.
cuteprogramming 
next week 5 August ,2nd Jap