A coronavirus-focused linkfest is for now a weekly feature here on Abnormal Returns. Please stay safe and find a vaccination site near you. You can read last week’s edition here.
Quote of the Day
"SARS-CoV-2 is new to our immune systems. That makes it very dangerous. Viruses that are new to us spread faster and are more lethal than old familiar ones."
(Dylan H. Morris)
Chart of the Day
The U.S. is administering about a million vaccine doses a day.
Vaccines
- Moderna ($MRNA) is seeking full approval of its Covid vaccine from the FDA. (politico.com)
- The immunocompromised are likely to be the first group to get booster shots. (wsj.com)
- Vaccinated household members help keep family members safer. (medrxiv.org)
- A pediatrician on why you should get your child vaccinated. (theatlantic.com)
- Some hints of a link between the vaccines and myocarditis in young men. (nymag.com)
- Getting vaccinated can be an emotional experience. (scientificamerican.com)
Vaccine lotteries
- Pulling out all the stops to get people vaccinated, including Anheuser's Busch offer of free beer. (cnn.com)
- All in all, vaccine lotteries are cost-effective way of boosting shots in arms. (wsj.com)
- Chalk one up for behavioral science. (wired.com)
Canada
- Canada is now allowing the use of different vaccines. (cnn.com)
- Canada is doing well with a first-doses first policy. (marginalrevolution.com)
Masks
- U.S.-based mask manufacturers are getting squeezed by Chinese competitors. (nytimes.com)
- Masking is an old practice. Will it stick in the U.S. post-pandemic? (washingtonpost.com)
Testing
- Why testing still matters. (marginalrevolution.com)
- The UK built up its testing capabilities during the pandemic. (ft.com)
Data
- Vaccines work: case counts are down to March 2020 levels. (axios.com)
- What statistics best tell us about the impact of the pandemic on the population? (econbrowser.com)
- It's not just influenza that fell off the table in the past year. (wsj.com)
Treatments
Global
- Brazil's push to vaccinate an entire town shows the efficacy of vaccination. (wsj.com)
- The U.S. is going to use Covax to distribute extra vaccine doses. (npr.org)
Lab leak hypothesis
- A long read into the lab leak hypothesis and why the more time goes by the less likely we are to know the truth. (vanityfair.com)
- Why the lab-leak hypothesis matters. (unherd.com)
Earlier on Abnormal Returns
- Coronavirus links: armchair epidemiologists. (abnormalreturns.com)
- There's only one way through the pandemic tunnel. (abnormalreturns.com)
- The 'Swiss cheese model' and the importance of avoiding single points of failure in pandemic and life. (abnormalreturns.com)
- On the challenge of holding two competing thoughts on the pandemic in your head a the same time. (abnormalreturns.com)
Mixed media
- A Q&A with Francis Collins who is the head of the National Institutes of Health about the miracle that are mRNA vaccines. (theatlantic.com)
- The passing of the pandemic will re-expose problems that were in place, pre-pandemic. (project-syndicate.org)
- The pandemic showed that the U.S. fails when it comes to taking collective action. (vox.com)
- The pandemic shows us humans to be bad at making big decisions. (bloomberg.com)
