Weekly Roundup COVID-19 Vaccine Development, Policy, and Public Perception in the United States

People, Perceptions, and Poll

COMMENTARY What Makes Vaccines Social? Like many social scientists working in the fields of vaccine uptake and disaster response and recovery, we anticipated that widespread acceptance of COVID-19 vaccines would be a critical issue—an issue upon which the success of the vaccination campaign, and the solution to the pandemic, would hinge. That is what we are now seeing today. (Sapiens, 1/15/21)

GUIDANCE Public health messaging 101: How to convince the vaccine skeptics. How can health care organizations tailor public health messages that will reach specific population groups in an efficient manner that will actually increase uptake? Brian Castrucci, DrPH, President and CEO of the de Beaumont Foundation and Georges Benjamin, MD, Executive Director of the American Public Health Association, shared a few insights to help health care CEOs create an effective COVID-19 vaccine public health messaging strategy.. (Health Evolution, 1/14/21)

OPINION Women Will Bear the Burden of Getting Our Aging Parents Vaccinated. Women in this country are more likely to leave the workforce to care for an elderly parent, and those who do provide care are less likely to be employed in general. And because so much of the Covid-19 vaccine scheduling is being handled online, it also means that it won’t just be women with “elderly” parents taking on this new workload. (Medium, 1/15/21)

NEWS Black Doctors Explain How to Overcome Reluctance Toward the COVID Vaccine. Generally, Black folks face more barriers to vaccination and don’t receive treatment as frequently as their white peers. Along with the historical record and personal experiences of medical mistreatment, this tends to guide one’s health decisions away from taking part in immunization campaigns.. (Slate, 1/16/21) See also: I'm a disabled woman of color. Here's how I overcame my fear of receiving a COVID vaccine (USA TODAY, 1/14/21) Black Americans Are Getting COVID Vaccines at Lower Rates Than White Americans (Scientific American, 1/20/21)

INTERVIEW Former Anti-Vaccine Mom Explains How Movement Pulled Her In, And How She Left. The anti-vaccine movement has existed in various forms for decades. The Internet and social media created a surge in misinformation. We profile a mother who got pulled in, and how she got out. (NPR, 1/18/21) See also: To Overcome Vaccine Hesitancy, We Need a Better Patient Experience (Harvard Business Review, 1/15/21) Acceptance of COVID-19 vaccine is rising, but so is pessimism about getting back to normal (USA TODAY, 1/18/21) Opinion: Social media platforms should deny service to superspreaders of disinformation (Washington Post, 1/15/21)

OPINION We Still Don’t Have An HIV Vaccine. That’s Why You Should Get One For COVID-19. Our society’s experience with HIV shows us just how grateful we should be that we have COVID-19 vaccines and that we have them so quickly. And it shows how critical it is for everyone, barring a legitimate health reason, to get a COVID-19 vaccine the minute they’re eligible. We can’t afford hesitancy about these shots. (BuzzFeed News, 1/15/21)

NEWS What to Know About Vaccine-Linked Deaths, Allergies. Many people who’ve received the first two Western shots deployed, one from Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE, and another from Moderna Inc., have experienced fever, headache and pain at the site of the injection. These side effects generally disappear quickly. More worrisome, Norway has reported deaths among elderly people with serious underlying health conditions following administration of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine -- possibly linked to those side effects. (Bloomberg, 1/18/21)

POLL Americans criticize vaccine rollout as too slow. Most Americans are not satisfied with the coronavirus vaccine distribution in their state, with a majority saying it is going too slowly and feeling that the process of how to go about getting a vaccine hasn't been well-explained yet. This comes as more people are now interested in getting vaccinated, with those most eager to get one more critical of the speed of its rollout. (CBS News, 1/17/21) See also: More Than Half of States Widen Access to Vaccine, Raising Hopes as Well as Chaos (New York Times, 1/15/21) Less than 40 percent of Trump voters want the coronavirus vaccine, poll finds (Yahoo! News, 1/19/21)

OPINION If You’re Offered a Vaccine, Take It. There’s no question that vaccine access has been inequitable across parts of the country. But many medical ethicists agree: If you are eligible for a vaccination, you should get it, no matter how worthy — or unworthy — you feel. (New York Times, 1/21/21)

R&D

RESEARCH Interim Results of a Phase 1–2a Trial of Ad26.COV2.S Covid-19 Vaccine. The safety and immunogenicity profiles of Ad26.COV2.S support further development of this vaccine candidate. (Funded by Johnson & Johnson and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority of the Department of Health and Human Services; COV1001 ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT04436276). (New England Journal of Medicine, 1/13/21)

PODCAST What Happens When You Get A COVID-19 Vaccine That Uses mRNA. On this week’s episode of PODCAST-19, we talk with Dr. Margaret Liu, one of the pioneers of gene-based vaccines, about vaccines that use mRNA to help us build immunity to COVID-19, including the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines. How is this method different from vaccines in the past, and what does the mRNA do once it gets inside our bodies? (FiveThirtyEight, 1/15/21)

NEWS The Second-Generation COVID Vaccines Are Coming. There are hundreds of other COVID vaccines under development—including many with new mechanisms of action—that could prove to be effective and cheaper and easier to distribute. (Scientific American, 1/20/21)

NEWS A Vaccine for Kids Is Coming, Slowly. With COVID-19 vaccines proven to be safe and effective in most adults, Pfizer and Moderna have both begun U.S. trials for kids as young as 12. And if those trials go smoothly, the vaccines will be tested in younger and younger kids. (The Atlantic, 1/21/21) See also: Vaccinating Children against Covid-19 — The Lessons of Measles (New England Journal of Medicine, 1/20/21) Covid-19 vaccine guidance for those who are lactating is based on faulty assumptions, experts say (STAT, 1/19/21)

NEWS Elderly begin to drop out of Novavax vaccine trial to get Pfizer and Moderna shots. They wanted to be “unblinded'' and find out if they had received a placebo in the Novavax study, and, if so, try to get the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, which have already been proved to be about 95 percent effective at preventing coronavirus infections. (Washington Post, 1/19/21)

RESEARCH The Benefits of Vaccinating With the First Available COVID-19 Coronavirus Vaccine. This study shows that there are relatively few situations in which it is worth foregoing the first COVID-19 vaccine available in favor of a vaccine that becomes available later on in the pandemic, even if the latter vaccine has a substantially higher efficacy. (American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 1/18/21)

NEWS Vaccines Need Not Completely Stop COVID Transmission to Curb the Pandemic. Sterilizing immunity may have been a lofty goal for COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers, though not necessary to curb disease. According to Natasha Crowcroft, senior technical adviser for measles and rubella at the World Health Organization, the very concept of such immunity is nuanced. “In reality, the spectrum of protection might best be framed as the extent to which vaccination prevents transmission of the wild-type virus or bacteria,” she says. (Scientific American, 1/18/21)

Policy

EXECUTIVE ORDER Executive Order on Ensuring an Equitable Pandemic Response and Recovery. The Secretary of HHS shall: "conduct an outreach campaign to promote vaccine trust and uptake among communities of color and other underserved populations with higher levels of vaccine mistrust due to discriminatory medical treatment and research, and engage with leaders within those communities." (The White House, 1/21/21) See also: Executive Order on Establishing the COVID-19 Pandemic Testing Board and Ensuring a Sustainable Public Health Workforce for COVID-19 and Other Biological Threats (The White House, 1/21/21) Here are the 10 executive orders Biden’s signing to combat the Covid pandemic (CNBC, 1/21/21)

STRATEGY National Strategy for the COVID-19 Response and Pandemic Preparedness. Full implementation of the National Strategy for COVID-19 will require sustained, coordinated, and complementary efforts of the American people, as well as groups across the country, including State, local, territorial, and Tribal governments; health care providers; businesses; manufacturers critical to the supply chain, communities of color, and unions. (The White House, 1/21/21) See also: Biden proposes a science-led New Deal to end pandemic suffering (Science, 1/15/21) Biden to deploy FEMA, National Guard to set up Covid vaccine clinics across the U.S. (CNBC, 1/15/21) Biden Picks Former F.D.A. Chief to Lead Federal Vaccine Efforts (New York Times, 1/15/21) U.S. Covid Vaccine Supply: How to Make Sense of Those Confusing Numbers (New York Times, 1/21/21)

NEWS How Operation Warp Speed Created Vaccination Chaos. States are struggling to plan their vaccination programs with just one week’s notice for how many doses they’ll receive from the federal government. The incoming Biden administration is deciding what to do with this dysfunctional system. (ProPublica, 1/19/21) See also: A Shot in the Arm (The American Prospect, 1/21/21)

NEWS Vaccine Critics Received More Than $1 Million in Pandemic Relief Loans. Six organizations that have made claims scientists have called false received Paycheck Protection Program loans totaling more than $1.1 million, according to data from the Small Business Administration, which manages the program. (New York Times, 1/18/21)

NEWS Trader Joe's, Dollar General And Others Are Paying Workers To Get Vaccines. Paying people is an idea that is winning adherents, but it also has its critics, who believe that offering to pay people could actually reinforce skepticism about the vaccine by making it seem risky. (NPR, 1/21/21)

WEBINAR COVID-19 Vaccination: What is Needed Now to Meet the Needs of the Hardest Hit Populations in the United States. We will discuss how the vaccination campaign is going, what the federal government can do to support a successful immunization effort, and the systems that need to be built for future mass vaccination efforts. The webinar will take place on January 28, 2021, 11 AM EST. Registration is required. (Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, 1/21)

Public Health Practice

NEWS Should We Change COVID Vaccine Doses to Reach More People? What the Data Say. Scientists are debating whether to delay, skip or halve doses. But untested tweaks could shake public confidence. (Scientific American, 1/14/21)

NEWS How Many Vaccine Shots Go to Waste? Several States Aren’t Counting. The CDC says health facilities should report unused and spoiled COVID-19 vaccines, but many are failing to do so. At a time when there aren’t enough shots to meet demand, significant numbers may be going in the trash. (ProPublica, 1/21/21)

NEWS Some Medical Students Celebrate With Covid Vaccine Selfies as Others Wait in Line. In December, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced guidelines establishing priorities of who should get the vaccines first as the rollout began. Although the guidelines were broad, medical students learned that they could be included among the first wave of health care workers, especially those involved with care of Covid patients. But the rollout has varied widely across the country’s 155 medical schools, which have each set priorities based on the availability of vaccine doses in their state. (New York Times, 1/14/21)

OPINION How to Distribute 100 Million Vaccine Doses in 100 Days. Administering 100 million doses in 100 days would be the most ambitious vaccination campaign in U.S. history. It needs support that will be equal to the task. (New York Times, 1/20/21)

ANALYSIS Orchestrating Systems-Level Change in the Battle Against COVID-19. As of today, no group or institution—no corporation, business consortium, government entity, or international agency—can single-handedly design and implement a system to provide the vaccine to all seven billion people on Earth. In the United States, the lack of planning for vaccine delivery may be even more stark: While the United States is mounting the largest vaccination development effort in history, there is a serious lack of strategy for building trust and for distributing the vaccine, especially to the most-marginalized and highest-risk populations. (Stanford Social Innovation Review, 1/13/21)

NEWS What would you pay for a COVID vaccine? Scammers are betting it's a lot. "These are the bad guys posing as someone, usually a government agency, although sometimes they have posed as the vaccine makers themselves, trying to trick consumers to give either money or to give sensitive information," Jon Steiger from the Federal Trade Commission told 3News. (WKYC, 1/16/21)

NEWS With Fewer Resources, Rural America Tackles Vaccine Distribution. Data show that rural residents are less likely to receive a flu shot than residents of metropolitan areas. This trend, combined with the reluctance of rural communities to embrace coronavirus mitigation measures, has some experts worried. (Undark, 1/20/21)

NEWS If They Nail Vaccinations, Drugstores Will Be the Heroes of 2021. U.S. pharmacies gave out about a third of adult flu shots in 2018, up from just 18% in 2012. President Joe Biden’s ambitious $20 billion plan to reboot the troubled vaccine distribution rollout to deliver on his pledge of 100 million shots in 100 days will rely, in part, on drugstores. “We are going to fully activate the pharmacies across the country,” Biden said on Jan. 15. (Bloomberg, 1/21/21)

This newsletter supports CommuniVax, a research coalition convened by the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and the Texas State University Department of Anthropology, with support from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.