- The US was one of only two among 21 similarly wealthy countries— along with Israel — in which life expectancy continued to decline last year.
- Covid seemed to crowd out the flu for the last two years. Some experts expect a big comeback this fall.
- Not following the science: In one of the few education programs the federal government directly oversees — Head Start preschools and child care centers for low-income families — mandatory masking rules are still on the books for teachers and children as young as 2-years-old.
- David Henderson: School shutdowns will shorten lives.
- DeLong: for at least 300,000 years – up until about 1870 – virtually all of our ancestors lived at the subsistence level.
- Some states spend twice as much per person on health care as other states.
- CVS is spending $8 billion to bring back doctor house calls.
Category: Health Economics & Costs
Covid Vaccine Makers Won’t Share Vaccines for Next-Gen Research
In his Wednesday Links, John Goodman points to the question, Why aren’t we developing more nasal vaccines? This from Alex Tabarrok at Marginal Revolution:
Nasal vaccines are more likely to stop infection than vaccines injected into muscle because they stimulate mucosal immunity in the nose and respiratory system, the first line of attack, and they are likely to increase uptake especially among people with trypanophobia. Hence my longstanding call for an Operation Warp Speed for nasal vaccines. We haven’t got OWS 2.0 in the United States but nasal vaccines have recently been approved in China and India.
White House: Covid is Here to Stay, as are Annual Boosters
Covid boosters are here to stay according to White House officials. They will likely be similar to annual flu shots, with a new booster to defend against a new variant every year. There were discussions a year ago that suggested drug makers were looking for a common denominator that would be present in all Covid variants, but I doubt that will happen. First of all it’s not easy or it would have been done already for flu shots and Covid boosters. Second, why would drug makers make a universal vaccine when they can sell boosters for new variants every year?
Tuesday Links
- Why Jackson Miss. doesn’t have water: they gave too much of it away for free.
- Why the prohibition on consuming raw milk from your own cow really matters.
- The latest fertility numbers. It takes 2.1 births per woman of child bearing age to replace a country’s population. Most developed countries are well below that.
- The downside of capping the price of insulin: it will encourage its use over newer, better, and more expensive alternative treatments. ”That will mean more disease, more disability, and more death from diabetes.”