5 Things to Know About a COVID Vaccine: It Won鈥檛 Be a 鈥楳agic Wand鈥
Approval of a vaccine will be an important step in defeating COVID-19. But it won鈥檛 immediately end the pandemic.
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Approval of a vaccine will be an important step in defeating COVID-19. But it won鈥檛 immediately end the pandemic.
Data and safety monitoring boards work under a cloak of secrecy meant to prevent undue influence by stakeholders, such as companies or the government. In the Trump era, some worry the anonymity could actually invite it.
President Donald Trump has the legal power to authorize a COVID vaccine over the objections of the Food and Drug Administration and vaccine manufacturers. Such a move could further erode public trust in a vaccine and foist an unsafe shot on Americans.
KHN and California Healthline staff made the rounds on national and local media this week to discuss their stories. Here鈥檚 a collection of their appearances.
The National Institutes of Health has suggested minorities should be overrepresented in COVID-19 vaccine trials 鈥 perhaps at rates that are聽double their percentage of the U.S. population. But efforts to recruit patients from racial minority groups are just beginning, while some trials have already advanced to phase 3.
The AstraZeneca trial is on hold in the U.S. as scientists try to unravel whether a rare neurological condition is linked to the vaccine. But regulators are frustrated by a lack of information from the drugmaker.
Kaiser Health News gives readers a chance to comment on a recent batch of stories.
Republicans have all but abandoned the Affordable Care Act as a campaign cudgel, judging from their national convention, at least. Meanwhile, career scientists at the federal government鈥檚 preeminent health agencies 鈥 the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health 鈥 are all coming under increasing political pressure as the pandemic drags on. Joanne Kenen of Politico, Mary Ellen McIntire of CQ Roll Call and Sarah Karlin-Smith of the Pink Sheet join KHN鈥檚 Julie Rovner to discuss this and more. Plus, Rovner interviews KHN鈥檚 Elizabeth Lawrence about the latest KHN-NPR 鈥淏ill of the Month鈥 installment.
About 60% of poll respondents are worried that federal regulators will rush to allow a vaccine because of political pressure. Opposition to getting a vaccine that might be authorized before the November election is strongest among Republicans.
Traditionally, requirements that kids undergo certain immunizations before attending school have been a critical public health tool. Health officials are scrambling to make sure children don鈥檛 fall through the cracks.
Efforts are underway to bring to market a vaccine for valley fever, a fungal infection with COVID-like symptoms that occurs in the deserts of the Southwest. The illness is getting more attention as cases rise and a warming climate threatens to spread it through the West.
As the nation awaits a vaccine to end the pandemic, local health departments say they lack the staff, money, tools 鈥 and a unified plan 鈥 to distribute, administer and track millions of vaccines, most of which will require two doses. Dozens of doctors, nurses and health officials interviewed by KHN and The Associated Press expressed their concern and frustration over federal shortcomings.
The nation鈥檚 top infectious disease official is confident that an independent panel will base vaccine approval on science, not politics.
Donald Trump accepted his party's nomination to seek reelection for a second term as president in front of a partisan audience that appeared to largely lack masks and opt against social distancing.
A robust sign-up for flu shots could help head off a nightmare scenario in the coming winter of hospitals stuffed with both COVID-19 patients and those suffering from severe effects of influenza. Plus, no one knows how flu and COVID might interact if a patient got both.
Harbor-UCLA Medical Center serves patients who are especially vulnerable to the coronavirus: They are essential workers, have chronic diseases and are members of underrepresented racial and ethnic groups. When the safety-net hospital kicks off enrollment for its COVID-19 vaccine trial Wednesday, it will look to those patients to participate.
Advocates of cheap and widely available vaccines thought the pandemic might change business as usual. They were wrong.
Polio terrified Americans, and in 1955, when Jonas Salk鈥檚 vaccine became available, they snapped it up like candy. Sixty-five years later, COVID is the latest dread virus, but many undercurrents could inhibit its acceptance.
A small allergy clinic in Medford, Oregon, might seem an unlikely place to recruit hundreds of volunteers to test the Moderna vaccine against COVID-19. But its steward has a record of leading hundreds of clinical trials.
People have flooded U.S. testing sites with requests to participate in the pivotal, late-stage clinical trials of the first two COVID-19 vaccine candidates.
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