Today we continue our retrospective series with a look at articles on COVID published at The Medical Care Blog. As the U.S. approaches three full years with the pandemic, it continues to see roughly 100,000 diagnosed cases (and about 400 deaths) per day. This is a level of sickness that many other developed countries see as intolerable.
As part of a reckoning with this reality, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently announced a shake-up of its organization.
The series of articles we highlight here are a time capsule from the early days of the pandemic. The authors make educated guessed about what the future could hold. And they envision ways the country (and its health care system) might learn from the pandemic. As you re-read them, you might ask if we have learned those lessons.
COVID-19: Health and the Coming Economic Recession by Joshua Rothschild
The pandemic took a major economic tool on most countries. In the U.S., the COVID-19 response benefitted many families’ bank accounts, but also contributed to inflation. This inflation has become the center of most policy discussions. In this article from 2020, Joshua Rothschild looks at the impacts of recession on people’s health. It turns out that there are implications for health that you may not expect.
COVID-19: Lessons for Climate Change Strategy by Raj Fadadu
The pandemic and climate change are both international emergencies. Published in 2020, Rad Fadadu asks us to think about how both emergencies are impacting vulnerable communities. He offers lessons that we might learn at both a policy level and in our individual lives. Could the changes we made at home during the pandemic also lead us to live more sustainably?
Born in a Crisis: How COVID-19 May Change the U.S. Health Insurance System by Emily Gillen
There is no question that health care systems were strained during the pandemic. The same could not be said for health insurance plans, whose profits soared. In this article from 2020, Emily Gillen notes how Medicaid enrollment grew as employers cut jobs and the economy shrank. With government paying for care for a record number of people, she asks whether it might be the right time to move to a single payer program.
COVID-19: Issues of Equity in Allocating Resources by Judith Garber, Shannon Brownlee, and Vikas Saini
The pandemic is fraught with inequality at every level. Before a vaccine was announced, Judith Garber and colleagues called our attention to the need for equity in how we both treated and eventually prevented COVID-19. The same equity issues are playing out with health issues ranging from Monkeypox to climate change. And their call to lessen racial health disparities through attention to equity reads as timeless.
COVID-19 Vaccine Plan Must Include Primary Care by John Wennberg, Gregory Stevens and Yalda Jabbarpour
In this article from 2021, John Wennberg and colleagues pointed out an odd thing. Public health agencies distributed most of the vaccines. But the average primary care provider–the source of most vaccinations nationally–was left out. Overlooked in so many ways, the authors argued that primary care needs to be a partner at the forefront of the pandemic and beyond.
Gregory Stevens