Prognosis: Misconception

The coming week could mark an early turning point in the U.S. battle against Covid-19. An advisory panel made up of top medical experts will meet December 10th to help the Food and Drug Administration review the drug for possible emergency authorization. That would clear the way to making it a top weapon against the virus. Reporter Anna Edney breaks down the next steps in the approval process, and helps explain the reality of making the vaccine available to the public.

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Weeks before U.S. states expect to receive their first shipments of Covid-19 vaccines, they’re getting conflicting messages from the federal government about exactly how many doses may arrive. Some governors have made splashy announcements about how much of Pfizer and BioNTech’s vaccines they expect to get if the U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorizes them this month. Other states can’t provide a solid answer. But all of them must submit orders and distribution plans Friday. Reporter Angelica Lavito reports that the shifting expectations are creating all sorts of problems.

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One of Joe Biden’s first acts as president-elect was to announce a Covid-19 advisory board, putting the fight against the pandemic front and center in his presidential plans. On today's episode, a member of that advisory board talks to us about how a Biden White House plans to overhaul the government’s Coronavirus response.

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In Canada, the Covid-19 outbreak has affected much of the country. In Quebec, where three in five of Canada’s virus deaths have hit, rage over new lockdowns is palpable. In Ontario, ICUs are filling up. Out west, caseloads are hitting records.

But four eastern Canadian provinces, comprising 2.4 million people, have banded together, barred outsiders, and hewed tightly to health guidelines. As a result, the region has a Covid-19 death rate that’s one tenth the rest of the country’s. With almost no one noticing, Atlantic Canada has become a pandemic Shangri-La. Montreal Bureau Chief Sandrine Rastello reports on the outpost of quiet obedience that calls itself the Atlantic Bubble.

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Today’s episode is a collaboration with Bloomberg Law. Hosted by David Schultz, this special investigative podcast examines how businesses of every stripe, large and small, assumed they had insurance that covered them in the event of a shutdown and how those assumptions were, by and large, wrong. 

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Everyone is fighting the same coronavirus, but nearly a year into the pandemic, quality of life and control of the pathogen’s spread look vastly different across the world. Bloomberg’s new Covid Resilience Ranking scores the largest 53 economies on their success at containing the virus with the least amount of social and economic disruption. Rachel Chang discusses the data and the analysis that went into determining the best places for weathering the pandemic. 

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Amid a lame duck presidency and with the widespread availability of a COVID-19 vaccine still months away, US governors have become the first line of defense against the pandemic’s winter onslaught. Emma Court discusses how, with a lack of federal leadership, it has fallen to local authorities to impose mask mandates, curfews, and potentially even lockdowns before the winter, and the holidays, hit.

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Restaurants across the country have been building and using outdoor dining spaces since the summer. But as winter approaches, many establishments are converting them into sheds or tents to help keep customers warm. As Kristen V. Brown reports, these new structures can sometimes feel more indoors than outdoors. We wondered how safe they really are for patrons.

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In a mere nine months, Eli Lilly accomplished an unprecedented feat: The drug giant took a blood sample from one of the first U.S. patients to recover from Covid-19, identified an antibody that could fight the virus, and created a version of the antibody to treat people with the disease. Riley Griffin spoke to Lilly's CEO David Ricks about the challenges facing the company and its new treatment amid the worsening pandemic.

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It’s taken less than a year for scientists to develop what appears to be an effective vaccine against the coronavirus. Drugmaker Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech delivered dazzling preliminary results in a large patient trial this month, and just today Moderna announced that its vaccine also looks extremely effective. But creating a vaccine is only part of the challenge. Jason Gale spoke with top US infectious-disease doctor Anthony Fauci about another impediment to a successful vaccination strategy: people not wanting to take it.

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