Senior nurse Joanna Sloan receiving the covid vaccination.
Photo: AP Chai Brady and Jason Osborne
Healthcare chaplains have said they hope the roll-out of the coronavirus vaccine will be the beginning of a new era of hope for patients and the wider community.
A nurse in Belfast became the first person on the island of Ireland to get the vaccine on Tuesday – the feastday of the Immaculate Conception.
Fr John McAlinden, chaplain in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda said the vaccine “has given everyone a glimmer of hope” nine months and 11 days after the first Covid-19 case in Ireland.
However, he cautioned that “It will take time for this vaccine to be rolled out, so I don’t think we’re out of the woods yet”.
The Director of Pastoral Care in Tallaght University Hospital in Dublin Fr John Kelly told The Irish Catholic that like all healthcare professionals chaplains are currently working in “tense situations” and the vaccine will help protect them and ensure patient safety.
“There is great excitement that there is a vaccine on the horizon,” he said. However, he warned that “It’s a big roll out to get us into a safer place before we can begin to reduce the necessary PPE – before we begin to get the closeness again, before we can return to some visiting and family visiting. We’re still a long way off,” Fr Kelly, who is also the Chairperson of the Healthcare Chaplaincy Board, said.
Healthcare chaplain at Cork University Hospital Rev. Daniel Nuzum welcomed the vaccine as a “tremendous breakthrough” and said he is hopeful that it will mark a “gradual journey towards a better future”.
“It’s giving a much-wanted hope because chaplains – like many other priests and clergy out in the community – have seen first-hand the impact of Covid-19, not just on the people who have sadly contracted it and died, but the impact of it is being felt by everybody because we’re all living with the consequences and precautions of it, which are immense,” he said.
Chaplain of the Royal Victoria hospital in Belfast and head of the Northern Ireland Healthcare Chaplains Association Fr Robert Sloan said: “The fact that the vaccine is here will give us all a boost and more peace of mind, especially going home to friends and family.”
He added that since family visits have been limited people are more chatty and really appreciate them, adding it has also put “more pressure on chaplains, but we’re finding people more receptive”.
On concerns about resistance to the vaccine or misinformation circulating in some leaflets, Fr McAlinden said that some people are concerned but he thinks “common sense will prevail”.
“Anyone that I’ve spoken to is very anxious to avail of the vaccine and I think we have to trust in our medical experts and take their advice. There is a worry that speculation and maybe ill-informed comments were being made about the vaccine: it had been rushed through or it’s only 95% effective, but our medical experts tell us that it’s a step in the right direction and I would hope that people would take that on board and listen to them.”
If there have been any positive aspects of the pandemic he said, it was that the role of the chaplain has been more defined and more appreciated than in the past.
Rev. Nuzum said “Everything in life involves a measure of risk: if I sit into my car there’s always a risk, but the benefit outweighs the risk. The benefit outweighs the risk in the vaccine. I trust our scientists in this regard”.
Fr Kelly described as “marvellous” the fact that “the scientists and the scientific world have worked hard to come up with this. Where is God? God is with these people at the moment. We’re not looking towards another dark winter – in some ways there is light: there’s a dawn of hope.”