As I said, it will come down to how the state wants to distribute their allotments, assuming the Biden covid group sticks with those plans. How does the CO governor know what his allotment is yet? Which vaccine(s)?
It’s going to be interesting to see who receives the vaccine. During H1N1 vaccine distribution (also run by the states), health care workers did not get it (accept it) at very high rates.
The Moderna CEO said today every adult in the US should have access to a vaccine by the end of May. Remains to be seen what proportion get it.
Edited to add: Many believe that those who have had covid absolutely need to still be vaccinated.
I think the initial doses you are talking about will be out this year? That leaves a lot of time for both vaccines to get revved up in production. I don’t think anyone really knows how many of each vaccine will be available in March, April, May, etc.
Are you saying that no private entity like a private college or high school will be able to buy vaccines? Why not?
wow! I’m going to let myself enjoy that comment for a few minutes. If that’s true then college kids and faculty will have a vaccine to take no matter how they get it.
Yes, that’s my understanding. The vaccines will only be distributed through the fed government to state and territorial governments. Unlike with testing kits that could be purchased privately, the vaccines will not be available to schools, even public schools, directly. Colleges could buy testing kits. Colleges might become authorized by their states to distribute the vaccinations, but can’t buy the doses directly.
Don’t expect masks to go away on a campus anytime soon. I heard an epidemiologist on the radio today that said even with the vaccine every person will still need to wear a mask for the foreseeable future.
Well I agree it’s great the medical cavalry is coming. And there is plenty of credit to go around! But looking at Moderna’s Wikipedia history section, it looks like Moderna is more of a Harvard brainchild.
From Wikipedia:
[edit]
In 2010, ModeRNA Therapeutics was formed to commercialize the research of stem cell biologist Derrick Rossi, who developed a method for modifying mRNA, transfecting it into human cells, then dedifferentiating it into stem cells that could then be further redifferentiated into desired target cell types.[14][15] Rossi approached fellow Harvard University faculty member Tim Springer, who called on Kenneth Chien, Bob Langer, and venture capital firm Flagship Ventures, to co-invest.[15][16]
So Rossi, Springer, and Chien, the originators, are from Harvard. Bob Langer who they brought in is from MIT. It sounds like Rossi is the original genius behind Moderna. Of course, every single person involved in this venture should be exceptionally proud!!! I’m a big fan of Harvard-MIT collaboration…the Broad Institute of Harvard & MIT is another great example of good work coming out of their partnership!!
By the way, this is meant entirely good-naturedly. If MIT wants to claim credit for Moderna being their brainchild, that’s ok with me, as long as a vaccine is delivered…
How this relates to school in the fall/spring/fall 2021? Well, hopefully we have a great partnership from 2 invested universities who are working together to bring a highly effective vaccine that will enable nearly-normal university operations by fall 2021… Great to see the solutions for universities coming out of universities… Wonderful that in the US we have so many incredible academic institutions (beyond the 2 mentioned here), contributing to so many of the solutions beyond just the Moderna solution. Love seeing various institutions working together to solve the problems of universities not only in the US but in ROW. Grateful.
I don’t wanna get too much into the details here as we will get moderators upset at us, but there are some internal disagreements between founders over who deserves credit for what. Suffice it to say, it takes more than one to parent a child, even if said parents don’t always agree on everything
One of the exciting opportunities DS20 eagerly embraced this fall was joining the problem-writing team for the Harvard–MIT Mathematics Tournament (HMMT, dubbed HMMO for Online this season).
DS24 is about to give those problems a whirl this week.
With a week left of in-person instruction, Haverford is holding strong with a total of 5 student and 7 employees testing positive over the semester. I’m hopeful they’ll see this semester’s success as a sign that they’re fine to move forward with their spring plans.
K-8 teachers getting the vaccine could be helpful in enabling reopening in-person K-8 school in school buildings which are difficult to mitigate risk (e.g. where classrooms have no windows and recirculating HVAC systems).
K-8 is probably the level of school where distance learning is most difficult to make work, and giving the teachers the vaccine would both immunize the most vulnerable people in the classrooms (some of the teachers are older and/or have risk-increasing pre-existing conditions) and immunize those most likely to be the spreaders in the classroom (since teachers do more talking than anyone else in the classroom). Of course, the latter is based on the vaccine reducing asymptomatic contagious infections, which is possible or likely, but not proven or checked for in vaccine trials.
That is probably a higher priority than college, which, despite the complaining in this thread, probably adapts to distance learning better than K-8 for most subjects.
This week our school district’s only senior HS switched to remote learning. This building is for grades 10-12. A week and a half ago there was one student that tested positive for covid19. Last week the school was notified by the local county health that there were 3 more positive cases. Contact tracing identified 9 staff and over 60 students that were either direct contact or second degree contact. I am not surprised as we’ve seen students not social distancing and sometimes without masks during lunch breaks (kids walking to local restaurant/deli stores) and after asking myself son about study hall, he said some students tend to huddle together in the back of the classroom with no social distancing and sometimes student either lowers the mask or improperly uses their masks.
This week is the last week for Colgate students before Thanksgiving break. Currently the campus has 0 case. Students were asked to sign up for departure slots to minimize the number of people on campus helping students during departure. None of the guests are allowed to enter the building. The school also received additional antigen covid test kits from NYS for students who want to be tested prior to going home. This test is free. This testing is on top of the 6% random testing that the school does frequently. The school also had been on Gate 4 for almost 2 weeks now.Also Madison county is also offering free covid testing for students/staff. Students who sign up to come back for the spring 2021 will follow the same guidelines set this fall prior to move-in. Most classes for spring are hybrid.
RIT on the other hand, has high positive cases so I am nervous for my son. Last week he complained of headache and sore throat with no fever. But after a day or two he was fine. The school is also offering a voluntary testing but it is limited. I told my son that he should try signing up for the test before he comes home next week. If he can’t get in, I will definitely have him tested once he is home. I also asked my sophomore daughter to do the same at Colgate. I plan to quarantine them for at least 10 days whether they get tested right away or not. They can have Thanksgiving dinner in their respective rooms. We have 2 sets of elderly parents living with us so we have to be cautious.
My sons school is not offering testing before kids travel home. They are really doubling down on how testing only gives you a snapshot of one moment in time and testing negative gives people a false sense of security. That said, MA wants him to have a test within 72 hours of traveling or quarantine for 14 days. He’s heavy into finals and end of semester papers right now so I haven’t been on him too much about this, but I’ve been doing my research about places near him he can get a test. It really irritates me that the school won’t test anyone unless they have symptoms or known contact with someone positive.
So D teaches 3rd grade and they started F2F at beginning of November. Now they are going to have the two school days of Thanksgiving week online. She is hopeful they make it thru this week. As predicted, there are not enough substitutes. The disease numbers don’t looks so bad on dashboard, but when close contacts have to quarantine it impacts the classes. One elementary school in district has a whole grade level without teachers and they sent a kindergarten class home today because no available teacher.
Area numbers are going back up. Feels like a no win situation. I wish D had same access to testing as D2 has in graduate school.
After stating that the school would revert to the earlier 2 day alternating model this week, the board decided Sunday the schools would be full remote through January 4.
I’m sure this Dec SAT will be cancelled here, so deciding to go early in Nov. really worked out.
Unless the country smartens up, next semester may also be like this.
