When could the COVID-19 vaccine be available at your drug store?

BALA CYNWYD, Pennsylvania (WPVI) -- When would a COVID-19 vaccine be available for you at your local drug store? It depends on several factors including approval, availability, age, health and maybe even your job.

Both Pfizer and Moderna have applied for emergency coronavirus vaccine approval in the United States with studies fast-tracked to approve a two-dose vaccine.

Health officials say the vaccines could become available as soon as mid-to-late December, or early January.

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There is not enough vaccines for every American to receive a two-dose shot right now. High-risk groups will get it first.

"I will not be first in line. I need to see what's going on first," said Tony, from Camden, New Jersey.

"I think that any vaccine is poison," said Julia Capaldi, of Wilmington.

But others are hopeful and ready to get the shot.

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"I will line up to take it. I'm 72-years-old, so anything that will advance public health," says John Dodge, of Villanova.

COVID-19 disproportionately affects people of color, and Dr. Delana Wardlaw, of Temple Health, says there's an understood distrust in the Black community when it comes to systematic racism in the healthcare system.

"Please, please, please don't let history allow you to become a statistic today," Wardlaw tells her pateints. "Again, we're being affected by disproportionate rates because of COVID. We have to do something differently, that means vaccinate."

"We need approximately 60%-70% of the population to receive the vaccine for it to be effective. So, I encourage (my patients) and their family members to be vaccinated."

Wardlaw wants to remind people that a vaccine would carry the same side effects as a flu shot, soreness at the injection site, slight fever, or headache.