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Federal health officials made an important decision last week to recommend that immunocompromised Americans receive an additional dose of the covid-19 vaccine. Unfortunately, they neglected to include a group that is increasingly left behind when it comes to coronavirus guidance: recipients of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. The Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention used two arguments to explain why their recommendation did not apply to J&J recipients. First, they cited lack of data. Second, they said the impact was limited because few of the immunocompromised got the J&J. (Leana S. Wen, 8/17)

Here we go again. Mask mandates. Tracking case counts. Wondering about whether schools will be open. Worrying about whether a stray sniffle is COVID-19 or a cold. It was supposed to be over by now. And yet here we are. But there is a ray of light in the doomsday sky. Our recent PRRI/IFYC Religion and the Vaccine Survey found clear progress in vaccine uptake, even among many hesitant groups, between the first wave of the survey in March and the second wave in June. Vaccine acceptance is up (from 58% to 71%), and vaccine hesitancy has been cut in half (from 28% to 15%). Today, only 13% are vaccine refusers. (Robert P. Jones and Eboo Patel, 8/18)

Over the last 18 miserable months, Americans have experienced great loss and hardship — and also, a miracle. With unprecedented speed, scientists invented not one but multiple safe and effective vaccines against COVID-19, the tools we desperately need to end this scourge that has killed more than 600,000 people, a toll that continues to mount by hundreds every day. It can sometimes be hard to recognize the magnitude of events as they’re happening. But in all of human history, no infection that kills so many has been conquered so quickly. It’s a staggering achievement. We have, not even two years after the disease first emerged, the kind of preventive measure that those who suffered through thousands of years of plagues and pandemics wished for in vain. (8/17)

The resurgence of Covid-19 cases in the United States and around the world, in large part due to the highly transmissible Delta variant, makes it even more crucial to step up the pace of the global vaccination campaign. To do that, some countries have sought to suspend intellectual property (IP) protections on Covid-19 vaccines and therapies. India and South Africa sponsored a proposal to that effect at the World Trade Organization (WTO). The proposal has since been endorsed by other countries, including the United States. They argue that eliminating IP protections would allow any willing company to produce lifesaving Covid-19 vaccines, making them cheaper and more widely accessible in low-income nations. (Michelle McMurry-Heath, 8/18)

It’s easy to argue for vaccinating adults and teenagers against COVID-19. Some think it’s harder to make the case for kids under 12 years of age, and for understandable reasons. Much of the world remains unvaccinated, kids have generally been much less affected by the coronavirus, and we don’t yet have a thorough understanding of the risks versus the benefits. Still, if we weigh all the pros and cons, the argument for immunizing young children is much stronger than the argument against. (Aaron E. Carroll, 8/17)

A day before Mkayla Robinson took her last breath, Governor Tate Reeves of Mississippi minimized COVID-19′s risk to children. “If you look at those individuals under the age of 12, what you find is that it is very rare that kids under the age of 12 have anything other than the sniffles,” he said. “Does it happen from time to time? Sure it does. I believe we have had one fatality of an individual, maybe it could’ve been two — I think there’s three under the age of 18 at this time? Two?” (Renee Graham, 8/17)

More than a year into a pandemic that has devastated millions, it is understandable to want to race toward the day when this dark chapter of history is behind us and simply move on. But failing to examine this ongoing crisis would be a missed opportunity to better position our healthcare system to tackle future health challenges and work better for everyone. While the pandemic hasn’t created new rifts in our system, it clearly exposed them. We need to acknowledge that the healthcare industry and those of us who work within it, have not adequately responded to some of our most pressing health concerns with the urgency they demanded, especially when it comes to serving communities of color. We must seize this moment to realign our healthcare priorities. (Dr. Shantanu Agrawal and Bryony Winn, 8/17)