Latest: US to spend $470M to learn more about long COVID-19
The U.S. government will spend $470 million to learn more about long COVID-19, its causes and potential treatments. The National Institutes of Health announced the plans Wednesday with a grant awarded to New York University and a goal of enrolling up to 40,000 adults and children nationwide. The effort, dubbed RECOVER, will involve researchers at more than 30 U.S. institutions.
As COVID-19 vaccine mandates rise, religious exemptions grow
About 3,000 Los Angeles Police Department employees are citing religious objections to try to get out of the required COVID-19 vaccination. In Washington state, thousands of state workers are seeking similar exemptions.
COVID-19 cases climbing, wiping out months of progress
COVID-19 deaths and cases in the U.S. have climbed back to levels not seen since last winter, erasing months of progress and potentially bolstering President Joe Biden’s argument for his sweeping new vaccination requirements.
Biden-Harris Administration Invests $20 Million in American Rescue Plan Funding to Improve Access to Affordable and Comprehensive Health Insurance
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), is awarding $20 million in American Rescue Plan (ARP) grant funding to State-based Marketplaces (SBMs) to increase consumer access to affordable, comprehensive health insurance coverage. The grants will be used by 21 SBMs to modernize IT systems and/or conduct targeted consumer outreach activities to help make health care coverage enrollment smoother. As a result, consumers will have access to increased financial assistance and eligibility determinations will be made faster.
The Bridge Between Public Health Education and Government Workforce Needs Fixing
The COVID-19 pandemic has uncovered long-term underinvestment in the public health workforce, including staff losses and underfunding for public health education, according to a new paper in the American Journal of Public Health. For training of individuals in health departments to succeed, we must assess needs, increase access to education for future public health professionals, and invest in the existing public health workforce, according to Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health authors Heather Krasna and Dean Linda P. Fried.
