Margaret Keenan, who a year ago became the first person to have a Covid vaccine jab, has urged people to get vaccinated.

The 91-year-old Fermanagh native said: “The best Christmas present I could have is being in good health and having had the jab, and feeling free from this horrible virus.”
The grandmother, who has also already also had her booster and flu jabs, described being a global name as “wonderful”.

Margaret – known as Maggie – was speaking at University Hospital Coventry, the place where a year ago to the day, on December 8 last year, she became the first person in the world to have a Covid-19 vaccine jab as part of a mass vaccine rollout.
She was joined by the matron who delivered the jab, May Parsons, who warned that unvaccinated young people and pregnant women were “gambling with their lives” by not getting vaccinated – urging them to come forward.

Looking back on the historic jab, Margaret – a mother of two, and a grandmother of four – said: “It felt great, honestly, I could not believe that things went so well, afterwards.
“At the time I wasn’t feeling good, but once I got that jab and things started to be better, I had a wonderful year – thanks to the NHS.”

Mrs. Keenan has lived in Coventry for more than 60 years but is originally from Belcoo.
Speaking about people who had not yet had any jab, she said: “It’s amazing how many people don’t want it. I don’t know why, because they should have it. Everybody should have the jab.”

The nonagenarian, who only retired from her job working in a jeweller’s six years ago, added: “I hope I’m a good example, skipping down the road.”

Posters of Mrs. Keenan and Ms. Parsons, marking the moment the historic first jab was delivered, are dotted all over the hospital.

The matron, who is in charge of the hospital’s Covid wards, came close to tears as she urged unvaccinated people to have a jab, saying too many unprotected people were dying on the wards.

She described them as “gambling with their lives”, adding: “This could have been avoided if they’d just had the vaccine.

“I manage Covid wards in this Trust. And just the amount of Covid patients that we’re getting who are young and fit and healthy, with no medical history, being really terribly ill with Covid, and also pregnant and young – and unvaccinated.

“Those are the people I would like to reach out to and find out the reasons why they are not having [covid vaccination], because they’re gambling with their lives.

“The amount of people we have seen that are young and pregnant, and who aren’t vaccinated – dying for the virus is just not right.”

She added: “The respiratory wards haven’t had any let-up in terms of Covid numbers. It’s always been Covid in my ward and it’s even more difficult now.

“We are also seeing young people that shouldn’t be there, and also seeing pregnant women that also shouldn’t be there.

“I feel personally, is there anything that I could have done more in terms of pushing the vaccine to these young people, or to people who think they’re fit and healthy and the virus isn’t going to touch them?

“It’s a really difficult scene to see people – with their lives in front of them – be devastated by the virus.

“You’ll get a lot of statements from them, saying, ‘I wish I’d had the vaccine’, but by that time, even if I give them 100 vaccines, it isn’t going to work.”

She said: “It is having that insight, having to see that, day in, day out, it’s a really heartbreaking time.”