Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Different Takes: US Vaccine Donation Goals; Prisons Ideal Setting For Covid Spread
The Washington Post: The Biden Administration Is Donating 500 Million Additional Pfizer Doses To The World
Since day one, President Biden has been clear that the only way to defeat covid-19 — and protect the American people and the U.S. economy — is to defeat the virus both here at home and around the world. Our most powerful weapon in this fight is safe and effective vaccines.Vaccinating Americans and vaccinating people around the world aren’t a choice; they are an imperative. That’s why we’re doing both. (Jeffrey Zients and Antony Blinken, 9/22)
USA Today: As COVID-19 Surges, Emptying Prisons And Jails Vital To Public Health
COVID-19 outbreaks are surging again in jails and prisons across the country as the delta variant takes advantage of persistent local and federal government policy failures to control the pandemic. The recent cases and violence at New York's Rikers Island show – in deadly ways – why emptying these institutions is vital for the protection of incarcerated populations, staff and surrounding communities. (Eric Reinhart, 9/23)
The Star Tribune: Biden's Unforced COVID Miscues
A more competent COVID-19 control plan driven by expertise, not politics, was one of President Joe Biden's key 2020 campaign promises. But two unforced pandemic management errors raise troubling questions about whether reality matches Biden's rhetoric eight months into his tenure. The first mistake: setting up July 4 as a breakthrough date in the battle against the virus despite warnings from experts about the potential for delta and other variants to upend progress. Well over a year into this pandemic, it should have been painfully clear that the "mission accomplished" moment was premature. (9/22)
The Washington Post: State Medical Boards Should Punish Doctors Who Spread False Information About Covid And Vaccines
Nineteen months into the covid-19 pandemic, American medicine is at an inflection point. Tens of thousands of physicians — and an even larger number of our colleagues in the allied health professions — have been caring for sick covid patients under extreme, often under-resourced, conditions. Many have become ill with the virus; more than 3,600 health-care workers are among the more than 668,000 Americans who have died because of it. With the development of three vaccines, we in the medical profession thought this nightmare might soon come to an end. We were wrong. (Nick Sawyer, Eve Bloomgarden, Mox Cooper, Taylor Nichols and Chris Hickie, 9/21)
Stat: Biden's Global Summit Covid-19 Targets Are Woefully Inadequate
As part of President Biden’s plan to address the global Covid-19 pandemic and inequitable distribution of vaccines, medicines, and tests to many parts of the world, he convened a global summit held virtually on Wednesday. Biden has asked for endorsement of a set of targets and commitment to directly address one or more of them. These targets fall terribly short of the ambition that’s needed to stop this global pandemic. (Brook K. Baker, 9/22)
The Washington Post: Far Too Many Pregnant People Remain At High Risk Of Covid-19. It Didn’t Have To Be This Way.
I’m worried about my pregnant patients. I have been from the beginning of the pandemic. This is not just because pregnancy clearly increases the risk of hospitalization, need for mechanical ventilation and death from covid-19. It’s also because pregnant people remain largely unvaccinated — a direct result of bad decision-making to keep them out of vaccine trials. It’s time we change these policies and let pregnant people make decisions for themselves. (Sarah N. Cross, 9/21)
