The United States’ Battle Against the Pandemic
Written by Jaanak Prashar
It was an auspicious start to the year 2020. The streets of America were buzzing in the vibrant excitement of the new year. Yet, within the ensuing months, these streets were abandoned, left only with the presence of nature to satisfy their loneliness. Needless to say, not a single soul was aware of what was to come in the near future, for there was not the slightest warning of the arrival of the infamous coronavirus. Indeed, within weeks, the pandemic notoriously made its way to the headlines of newspapers, and countless grieving family members were left behind in its trail.
Life would never return to a sense of normalcy
Fast-forward a year later, and the pandemic is finally being combatted through the distribution of FDA-approved vaccines (Acquah 2021). While these efforts awaken America with hope, much still remains elusive about the nation’s recovery from the pandemic.
COVID-19 Vaccines
What They Exactly Are and How They Work
To understand the science behind vaccines, in particular the COVID-19 vaccines, we must first remind ourselves of a few terms: pathogens, antibodies, and spike proteins.
Pathogens: A pathogen is an organism (living or dead) that causes disease. Pathogens are “widely diverse and comprise viruses and bacteria as well as unicellular and multicellular eukaryotes” (NCBI 2017).
Antibodies: Antibodies are proteins that are created by the immune system that help us fight off infections or diseases created by the pathogens themselves (CDC 2021). Antibodies are specific to certain pathogens, meaning that one antibody can not be used to attack several different types of infections.
Spike Proteins: Spike proteins are what allow pathogens, in particular viruses, to cause infections. For a virus to inject its DNA material into a cell, it first needs “access”: that is, its spike protein must fit exactly into the cell’s receptor protein. You can think of the cell’s receptor protein as a lock and the virus’s spike protein as a key. Therefore, the virus’s spike protein must fit exactly into the receptor protein for it to inject its DNA into the cell.
To understand vaccines, we must first consider their purpose: vaccines do not make an individual immune to a certain pathogen; rather they prepare one to fight off a pathogen (should they get infected) and mitigate the severity of the symptoms associated with the pathogen. When the body is “exposed to a pathogen for the first time, it takes time to produce antibodies” to target the pathogen (WHO, 2020). During this time, one can become ill and experience symptoms of the infection.
Vaccines against a certain pathogen do not contain the pathogen itself, but rather a weakened or dead form of the pathogen in order to prevent the patient from becoming sick. Once the weakened or dead form of the pathogen is injected into the patient’s body, the patient’s antibodies are activated. Since the same pathogen was introduced to the body, just in a weakened form, individuals still have antibodies that will protect them should they encounter the actual pathogen. Therefore, when one gets infected by a pathogen, its body doesn’t have to wait to produce antibodies, and there is no time for the symptoms to be manifested (CDC, 2021).
The COVID-19 vaccine follows exactly this process; however, instead of introducing a weakened or dead form of the COVID-19 virus, only a part of the virus is introduced, the spike protein. Once the spike protein is introduced into the body, antibodies against it are developed.
Understanding this science is essential for society to recognize the importance and efficacy of vaccines.
The Status Quo
The United States’ Progress Against The Pandemic As Of Present Day
Vaccine Inaccessibility
After months of development, vaccines are finally being distributed across the United States; however, many regions still remain forgotten. The Vaccines Project, as part of the Coronavirus Visualization Team, has analyzed this issue to a greater extent. Through their analysis, several vulnerable ZIP Codes in the United States have been identified, prompting a greater need for policymakers to take action. Ultimately, vaccine inaccessibility is a major impediment that needs to be combatted through the mobilization of vaccines and widespread awareness.
Demographic Correlations With Vaccine Accessibility
Further exacerbating the issue around vaccine inaccessibility is its correlation with certain demographic compositions. Indeed, according to an article written by the NPR, “Black and Latino people [across the country] consistently receive a smaller share of vaccine doses than they represent in overall population, COVID-19 cases and deaths” (Feldman, 2021). While such an issue remains yet to be eradicated, certain actionable items are slowly being developed, such as the construction of vaccination sites in underserved areas as well as the “[launching] of vaccination communication campaigns, often with a focus on reaching people of color” (KFF, 2021).
Vaccine Hesitancy
Coupled with vaccine inaccessibility in the United States is vaccine hesitancy: another impediment that is hindering America’s progress toward achieving complete immunity. Though vaccine hesitancy has recently declined, roughly “30% of the adult population in the United States” still remains unvaccinated. For a breakdown of vaccine hesitancy across U.S. states, you may visit the following website:
The causes of vaccine hesitancy in the United States can be attributed to several factors, some of which include vaccine misinformation and medical mistrust, as well as religious and philosophical exemptions (AJMC, 2021). Indeed, many individuals across the United States choose to be unvaccinated due to their religious and moral beliefs that they value. While such a cause may be valid, many states are starting to remove religious and philosophical vaccine exemptions — especially taking into account the newly-emerging Delta-variant and its profound symptoms.
In addition, misinformation — such as the beliefs that vaccines are unnecessary for young individuals, vaccines can affect one’s DNA, or that individuals do not need to get vaccinated after having COVID-19 — continue to dissuade numerous individual across the U.S from taking vaccines.
However, as false information regarding the development and progress of vaccines spreads, many efforts are simultaneously being undertaken to combat this issue. These efforts include vaccine communication campaigns, as well as information disseminated by the U.S. government. If you’d like to learn more about vaccine hesitancy and the means by which it can be addressed, feel free to check out this video created by world-renowned professors and scientists at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health:
The Future
While misinformation, medical mistrust, and vaccine hesitancy continue to plague the United State’s recovery from the pandemic, several initiatives are being taken, and the Coronavirus Visualization Team is one of them.
Founded on April 5th of 2020 by Lucas Chu, a student at Harvard University, the Coronavirus Visualization Team was created to answer research questions about the pandemic and relay this information to others in an accessible, understandable, and informative manner. Ultimately, at CVT, our mission is to combat misinformation surrounding this current pandemic by spreading active awareness and informing policymakers about key issues.
Through several projects, such as the Vaccines Project mentioned earlier in the article, the Coronavirus Visualization Team hopes to leave a lasting footprint in America’s progress against the pandemic through publications, articles, and partnerships.
While the CVT continues to mitigate the effects of the current infodemic, caused by the widespread inaccessibility of trustworthy COVID-19 information, other initiatives — such as nonprofits and campaigns across the U.S — attempt to promote vaccine accessibility with the development of FDA-approved vaccines.
An example of such an initiative is Health Leads, a nonprofit organization headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts. Health Leads hopes to promote an equitable distribution of vaccines across the U.S and accelerate the general population’s confidence in vaccines.
The United States is slowly achieving a period of normalcy through its development and distribution of vaccines; however, there are still many remaining issues — such as vaccine inaccessibility, hesitancy, and misinformation — that need to be ameliorated in order for the nation to achieve complete immunity and fully recover from this global crisis.
