Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Perspectives: Parents Refusing Covid Test For Kids To Avoid Quarantine; Is Vaccine Refusal A Protected Right?
Kansas City Star: Parents Not Having Their Sick Kids Tested For COVID
After a relatively quiet winter at Pediatric Partners in Overland Park, the sick kids have come roaring back this spring. They’re coughing. They have fevers. Their throats hurt. Could they have COVID-19? Pediatrician Kristen Stuppy says she doesn’t know: Many parents are refusing to have their sick children tested for the virus. (Lisa Gutoerrez, 4/28)
Los Angeles Times: There Is No Absolute Right To Refuse COVID Vaccination
More than half of American (and Californian) adults have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, and nearly a third are fully vaccinated. Vaccination has now been opened to everyone 16 and older. Our biggest worry in the coming months isn’t whether we’ll be able to deliver enough doses; it’s whether enough people will seek them. We’re getting closer to the point where every American who wants to be vaccinated will have gotten their needle stick. A quarter of Americans say they don’t plan to be vaccinated; in vaccine-friendlier California, that’s 1 in 5. (2/28)
Chicago Tribune: We Need A COVID-19 Memorial, Committed Public Health Funding
A century from now, will the grief and pain of the coronavirus pandemic be remembered by descendants of the dead? Epidemic deaths can cause long-lasting trauma for future generations. Reminiscing about her relatives a few years ago, tears fell down my mother’s face as she told me about two little girls who had died in a diphtheria epidemic. My mom wept for children who had died over 100 years earlier — two generations before her. (Leslie J. Reagan, 4/28)
The New York Times: The Math That Explains The End Of The Pandemic
The United States has vaccinated more than half of its adults against Covid-19, but it could be months until the country has vaccinated enough people to put herd immunity within reach (and much of the world is still desperately waiting for access to vaccines). Places with rising vaccination rates, like the United States, can look forward to case numbers coming down a lot in the meantime. And sooner than you might think. That’s because cases decline via the principle of exponential decay. (Zoe M. McLaren, 4/29)
The New York Times: What The Smallpox Vaccine Can Teach Us About The Covid Vaccine
Almost 14 months into the coronavirus pandemic, vaccines are, for most of us, the key to getting out of lockdown and returning to lives that we recognize. And with more than a billion doses administered worldwide, there are reasons for hope — even if that hope is not spread evenly. But for vaccines to work, we need enough people who are willing to take them. There are growing concerns that the United States might soon reach what some experts call the “vaccine wall,” when the problem stops being how to supply enough and starts being how to convince the holdouts — a recent NPR/Maris poll found that one in four Americans would refuse a vaccine if offered. In France, a December poll found that only 40 percent of the population intended to receive one. And rates vary widely around the world. (David Motadel, 4/28)
USA Today: COVID Vaccine: We Need Republican Heroes To Risk Careers To Save Lives
There has never ever been a better time for the "pro-life" movement of America to act urgently to, well, save some lives. America's supply of COVID-19 vaccines will soon surpass demand. Meanwhile Israel, with the most aggressive (yet imperfect) vaccine rollout in the world, has recorded multiple days with zero pandemic-related deaths for the first time in 10 months — suggesting that a comprehensive national vaccination program could contain the killer virus that has already killed nearly 575,000 Americans. Still, some Americans seem to be eager to stand in the way of any hope of what scientists call "herd immunity.” Who are those Americans? Mostly Republican men and white evangelicals — aka the people who’ve spent the past 40 years or so telling us they are much more concerned about “life” than everyone else. (Jason Sattler, 4/27)
The Washington Post: The Vaccines Are Working. So Is The Virus.
Welcome proof that vaccines are working comes from those who have received them. In Britain, Israel and the United States, coronavirus infections have plummeted among older people who were first to get the shots. This does not mean that the United States or the rest of the world has turned the corner against the pandemic. But it does show the power of vaccines as a tool if they can be administered widely enough — a goal that demands maximum effort everywhere. (4/28)
