- CDC adds booster shot trends to its dashboard: One significant update to the CDC’s COVID-19 dashboard this week: the agency has added daily booster shot administration trends to its Vaccination Trends page. Now, you can see how many booster shots are being given each day in your state; in New York, for example, I see clear jumps when eligibility opened to all adults, and when Omicron was identified after Thanksgiving.
- Global Health Security Index: Back in fall 2019, a group of public health and national security researchers put out an index that ranked 195 countries around the world on their capacity to respond to future health threats. The U.S. was ranked number one—a ranking that soon became laughable as the country proved to be incredibly unprepared for the COVID-19 pandemic. This week, the organization released their 2021 update to that index… and the U.S. is, somehow, still number one. Yet despite this, the researchers say, “no country is fully prepared for future pandemic or epidemic threats.”
- COVID Collaborative: Hidden Pain report: The COVID Collaborative is a team of health, education, and economic experts aiming to develop recommendations for U.S. leaders. Their recent Hidden Pain report focuses on children who lost parents or caretakers to COVID-19—a group that, the report estimates, includes over 167,000 children across the country.
- State Alcohol-Related Laws During COVID-19: The Alcohol Policy Information System has compiled a database of alcohol-related state laws during the pandemic, including rules about drinking both inside and outside of bars and restaurants. The database allows you to see when a specific state allowed restaurants to open or close, restrictions for take-out only, shortened hours, and more. (H/t Data Is Plural.)
