Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: We Must Tread Carefully With 'Godlike' MRNA Vaccines; Testing Critical To Solving Variant Problem
Newsweek: Miraculous MRNA Vaccines Are Only The Beginning
The Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines now being administered across the United States and the globe aren't just providing the first glimmers of hope in our struggle against COVID-19. They are also offering an early look at how the miraculous tools of the genetics revolution will transform our health care and our world over the coming years. But unless we can develop better ways to reap the great benefits while avoiding the potential harms of our Promethean technologies, our moment of triumph could set us on a path to disaster. Of all the species that have ever lived, our single group of hominins now has the capacity to remake all of biology. But while our ability to read, write and even hack the genetic code of life has advanced dramatically over recent years, our public consciousness and oversight systems have not kept pace. As the great naturalist E.O. Wilson once said, "We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions and godlike technology." (Jamie Metzl, 2/12)
Modern Healthcare: COVID-19 Vaccines Are A Triumph Of Medicine
I walked out of the vaccination center into a cold January afternoon after receiving the first of two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine. As a physician practicing pediatric radiation oncology, medical historian and health sciences educator, I stopped and thought: "I have just participated in an event unprecedented in human and medical history. "It is 13 ½ months since the World Health Organization was told about a new human viral disease occurring in Wuhan, China. It is 13 months since Chinese scientists publicly reported the genetic sequence of that virus. Multiple scientific teams throughout the world have created vaccines for the virus that are continuing to be clinically tested in large-scale human clinical trials, enormous quantities of that vaccine have manufactured and delivered to vaccination sites, and I was just injected with a dose of one of them. Never before in the history of human medicine has anything of this scope and scale been accomplished in so short a time period. I am fortunate to have lived to see it happen. (Dr. Edward Halperin, 2/11)
Stat: With Covid-19 Vaccines, 'Fair' Isn't Always Fair Enough
The success of Operation Warp Speed in delivering two effective Covid-19 vaccines in record time has stoked public optimism for an end to the pandemic. The difficult science has seemingly been done, and what remains is a simple supply chain problem: how to get shots into arms in the fairest and quickest way. (Martin Shell, 2/12)
Boston Globe: The COVID-19 Pandemic Has Laid Bare A Massive Civil Rights Crisis
After a year in its deadly grip, Americans are well aware of the damaging and dangerous impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet as we’ve seen, some communities are faring worse than others. A new report we have issued at the Harvard Kennedy School Carr Center for Human Rights Policy documents how people of color and low-income families have been hit the hardest in health care, education, employment, food security, environmental safety and housing. To address the public health crisis, assistance should be provided to those most in need. The nation will not emerge from the pandemic until the people most affected can recover. (John Shattuck and Daniel Estupinan, 2/11)
Chicago Tribune: ‘Mom’s Home; She’ll Do It!’ — And Other Pitfalls Of The Pandemic
It’s been a tough 11 months for mothers. For about a millisecond after the onset of the pandemic, I hoped that remote work would cause fathers to finally see all of the myriad household tasks mothers do every day and begin doing their fair share. It didn’t happen. Instead of curing the fairness gap, we got The Great COVID-19 Cop-out. (Joan C. Williams, 2/10)
Los Angeles Times: How Bad Is The COVID Variant Problem? We Can't Know Without Tests
As COVID-19 vaccinations slowly become available to more Americans, variants of the novel coronavirus have started circulating in the United States and elsewhere, making people wonder whether the shots are still worth getting. The answer to that is yes, more so than ever. The more freely the virus circulates, the more opportunity it has to mutate, scientists say. The best thing we can do to contain the number of variants is to vaccinate the world, as fully and as quickly as possible, while continuing to limit infections with face coverings and social distancing. (2/12)
The New York Times: How Germany Lost Control Of The Coronavirus
“We have lost control of this thing. ”Those were the words of Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, surveying the country’s situation in late January at a confidential meeting. She spoke with typical precision. In Germany, which on Wednesday prolonged its current lockdown until at least March 7, things are bad: Since October, cases have soared — they are only now starting to come down — and over 50,000 people have died. An atmosphere of grim resignation prevails. But wasn’t Germany one of the global leaders in pandemic control during the first wave? Didn’t Germans enjoy a fairly normal summer of trips to the beach and meeting with friends at beer gardens? Didn’t their children return to school, as normal, in August and September? (Anna Saurebrey, 2/11)
