Featured sources, June 27
Featured sources for the week of June 27 include vaccine hesitancy, nursing homes, and housing.
Read MoreMonth: June 2021
Will the Tokyo Olympics be a superspreading event?
Back in May, Sarah Braner wrote that Japan was seeing a COVID-19 spike in the lead-up to the Tokyo Olympics, which are scheduled to start in late July. The situation has remained worrying since then.
Read MoreDelta and Gamma are starting to dominate
Delta, or B.1.617.2, is particularly dangerous. As I’ve written before, this variant spreads much more quickly than other strains of the coronavirus and may cause more severe illness, though scientists are still investigating that second point. Thanks to this variant, it’s now much more dangerous to be unvaccinated than it was a year ago. It’s quickly becoming dominant in the U.S.
Read MoreLessons for COVID-19 from the HIV/AIDS pandemic
This is the last week of Pride Month for 2021, and it’s also officially Pride weekend in NYC, where I live. So, it felt appropriate for me to take this issue to highlight a couple of lessons that the U.S. response to COVID-19 has taken from our response to another pandemic—one that is still ongoing.
Read MoreNational numbers, June 27
Cases have continued to plateau this week, with less than a 5% drop in the daily average. As I’ve said in previous weeks, this is partially due to slowing vaccinations—the White House admitted last week that the U.S. won’t meet Biden’s July 4 goal—and partially due to the Delta variant, which now causes at least 20% of new cases in the country.
Read MoreCOVID source call-out: CDC’s county vaccination map
The CDC’s county-level vaccination map does paint a stark picture of vaccination disparities in the U.S., with the Northeast and West coast notably darker blue than parts of the South and Midwest. However, the CDC’s UI leaves much to be desired.
Read MoreFeatured sources, June 20
Featured sources for the week of June 20 include the Delta variant, doctor vaccinations, and hospital closures.
Read MoreNovavax vaccine performs well—including against variants
The COVID-19 news world saw a return of Monday-morning vaccine results this week. Novavax, a small biotech company based in Maryland, announced that its vaccine demonstrated 90% overall efficacy and 100% protection against moderate and severe COVID-19 disease.
Read MoreStates scale down COVID-19 reporting frequency
Two weeks ago, I reported that Florida had made a big change to its COVID-19 data reporting: the state switched from daily updates to weekly updates. Other states are making similar changes. Only about half of states update their COVID-19 data every day, NPR reported last week. But it is important to view these changes in context.
Read MoreEvaluating exposure notification apps: Expanded methodology behind the story
This week, I have a new feature out in MIT Technology Review. It’s an investigation into the usage rates and public opinion of exposure notification apps—those Bluetooth-enabled systems that promised to function as a method of digital contact tracing. You can read the story here; and for the CDD this week, I wanted to provide kind-of an extended methodology behind the piece.
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