[ad_1]
As of noon today, January 20, Dr. Rochelle Walensky will take over the lead of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – and one of her top priorities will be trying to right any damage done to the agency by the administration. Trump.
“How can I make sure that the people who are there – these amazing scientists, these amazing public servants for their entire careers – understand and feel the value we should place on them?” They have been reduced. I think they’ve been muzzled, that the science hasn’t been heard, ”Walensky said in a brief but broad interview with JAMA Tuesday. “This world-renowned, top-notch agency has not really been appreciated over the past four years and very significantly over the past year. So, I have to solve this problem.
Part of his plan to do this is to unravel these scientists and bring their science to the public where it can make a difference. And that blends into the next challenge: “We obviously need to get this country out of COVID and the current pandemic crisis,” she said. And it will also involve increased communication with the public, as well as with national and local health authorities and members of Congress.
Walensky – professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and head of the division of infectious diseases at Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital – will be a newcomer to the government health sector when she takes over the federal agency. more than 10,000 employees today. “I’m going to have all the benefits of coming in from the outside and being able to look in and say, ‘It just feels really broken to me,’ she said. For any institutional knowledge she will need, she will draw on a long-standing career staff, she added.
Like President-elect Biden, Walensky will immediately focus on helping facilitate and accelerate the deployment of the COVID-19 vaccine – and meet the administration’s goal of getting 100 million shots in the arms. during the first 100 days. According to CDC data as of Jan. 19, the government has distributed more than 31 million doses, but less than 16 million have been administered.
A little cushion
Stepping up the pace will involve helping states set the right conditions for immunization eligibility – conditions that aren’t so restrictive that vaccine doses end up sitting unused in refrigerators, or so loose as there is. long queues outside overwhelmed vaccination sites, she said. Biden’s team also aims to boost the manufacture of vaccine supplies, increase the number of people who can provide vaccines, and increase the number of places where vaccines are given.
Addressing one of the most pressing topics of the past few days, Walensky also said she and Biden’s team have an eye out for the disturbing coronavirus variants appearing in various places around the world, including the United States. . The team is working to “dramatically” strengthen surveillance efforts, including partnering with industry and academic labs, so that they can track any variants that develop or enter the United States and begin. to spread.
The main things to worry about with the variants are whether they spread more easily, if they cause more serious illness and death, and if they make therapies and vaccines less effective, she noted. We have seen variations that seem to spread more easily from person to person. But we have yet to see evidence that the variants increase illness and death or that they escape vaccines and therapies.
“I think the good news about the variants is that the efficacy of the vaccines is so good and so high that we have a little cushion,” she said. Even though laboratory studies show that vaccines are not as effective against one variant as the original strain, “we’ll probably end up with a pretty good vaccine.” His point has been echoed by many other experts who predict that it will take years before the coronavirus evolves to completely outwit immune responses.
“I just want to remind people: hardly any vaccine we have is 95% effective” like COVID-19 vaccines, she added. “So before I panic and say ‘well, should I really get the vaccine if this isn’t going to work against the variant?’ – This will work against the variant. Will it be 95%? May be. Will it be 70 percent? May be. But our flu shots aren’t 70% effective every year, and we still get them. So I’m very optimistic about how these variants will evolve. “
[ad_2]
Source link