‘I Can Breathe Again’: Older Adults Begin to Test Freedom After Covid Vaccinations
With a mix of relief and caution, older adults fully vaccinated against covid-19 are moving out into the world and resuming activities put on hold during the pandemic. Many are making plans to see adult children and hug grandchildren they haven’t visited for months — or longer. Others are getting together with friends indoors, for […]
Covid Vaccine Hesitancy Drops Among All Americans, New Survey Shows
A new poll of attitudes toward covid vaccinations shows Americans are growing more enthusiastic about being vaccinated, with the most positive change in the past month occurring among Black Americans. About 55% of Black adults said they had been vaccinated or plan to be soon, up 14 percentage points from February, according to a poll […]
Ask KHN-PolitiFact: How Can Covid Vaccines Be Safe When They Were Developed So Fast?
The development of the first covid vaccines may have seemed to occur at a dizzying pace. After all, scientists identified a new virus and created vaccines to protect against its most severe effects within a year. But the research underpinning these vaccines isn’t that new at all, vaccine experts say. Some of it is decades […]
Web Event: The Crucial Role of Home Health Workers, Unsung Heroes of the Pandemic
Even as the pandemic took a devastating toll on health care workers and older adults in the United States, many home care workers reported to work and provided vital care to vulnerable people despite the health risks to themselves and their families. KHN and The John A. Hartford Foundation held an interactive web event to examine the […]
In His Continued Sparring With Fauci, Sen. Rand Paul Oversimplified the Science
“Sorry Dr Fauci and other fearmongers, new study shows vaccines and naturally acquired immunity DO effectively neutralize COVID variants. Good news for everyone but bureaucrats and petty tyrants!” — Sen. Rand Paul in a tweet, March 21, 2021 That Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky often disagrees with infectious-disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci is well known. […]
Analysis: How the US Invested in the War on Terrorism at the Cost of Public Health
Here’s one big takeaway from our country’s disastrous 2020 covid response: For 20 years, we’ve lavished attention and money on fighting human terrorism and forgot that the terrorism of nature is equally deadly, deserving equal preparation. Today, with more than 545,000 U.S. covid deaths, I hope we’ve learned the huge cost of allowing our public […]
Scientists Seek Covid Treatment Answers in Cheap, Older Drugs
Could a decades-old antidepressant be a secret weapon against covid? A few scientists think so, after two small studies showed that fluvoxamine, typically prescribed for obsessive-compulsive disorder, prevented serious illness in all participants who took the pills soon after developing symptoms. It’s an exciting notion: A $10, two-week course of this drug could reduce death […]
Her Doctor’s Office Moved One Floor Up. Her Bill Was 10 Times Higher.
Kyunghee Lee’s right hand hurts all the time. She spent decades running a family dry cleaning store outside Cleveland after emigrating from South Korea 40 years ago. She still freelances as a seamstress, although work has slowed amid the covid-19 pandemic. While Lee likes to treat her arthritis with home remedies, each year the pain […]
How One State’s Public Health Defunding Led to Vaccination Chaos
ST. LOUIS — Missourians have driven hours to find vaccines in rural counties — at least those with cars and the time. Tens of thousands of doses are waiting to be distributed, slowly being rolled out in a federal long-term care program. Waitlists are hundreds of thousands of people long. Black residents are getting left […]
Stop Blaming Tuskegee, Critics Say. It’s Not an ‘Excuse’ for Current Medical Racism.
For months, journalists, politicians and health officials — including New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Dr. Anthony Fauci — have invoked the infamous Tuskegee syphilis study to explain why Black Americans are more hesitant than white Americans to get the coronavirus vaccine. “It’s ‘Oh, Tuskegee, Tuskegee, Tuskegee,’ and it’s mentioned every single time,” said Karen […]