Will The Vaccines Save Us? Listen To The Latest New Science Vs Episode

 It used to be that opening remarks to family, friends, co-workers or casual acquaintances defaulted to the weather, your health, your latest vacation, and the most current political dumpster fire. 

Today, however, these opening salvos can be heard thousands of times a day: "Are you getting vaccinated? Did you get vaccinated? Any side effects? Where did you get vaccinated? Can I get an appointment there?"

 It's fortunate that we have a podcast like Science Vs to keep us informed, informative, and impermeable to disinformation.

There are a lot of fads, blogs, and strong opinions, and then there’s the Science Vs podcast, hosted by Wendy Zukerman, to break down what’s fact, what’s not, and what’s somewhere in between. 

 

The latest episode explores the hopeful return to normal as the vaccine rollout expands across the country.

Since the early pandemic, Science Vs has delivered thorough, useful, and award-winning reporting on all aspects of the coronavirus. As more and more are eligible to receive the vaccine within the United States and throughout the world, today’s new episode asks the questions - could we really almost be near the end of this ordeal? Will the vaccines truly stop the virus from spreading? Or are the variants cropping up all over the world going to put a stopper on the hard-fought progress already made?

In the episode,  Dr. Ben Reis, of Harvard Medical School, joins Wendy to chat about his research conducted in Israel - one of the first countries to widely offer a vaccine to its population. His study tracked hundreds of thousands of folks who got vaccinated and found that a week after getting the second dose the vaccine was more than 90% effective.

  Professor Ann Sheehy, virologist and immunologist at The College of the Holy Cross, also joins to discuss the new variants of the virus, including the potentially dangerous Eek mutation. 

  Finally, Professor Pei Yong Shi, at the University of Texas Medical Branch, joins to discuss the coronavirus mutations even further and share his thoughts on whether our vaccination efforts will be compromised by these variants.

In our world where some politicians dispute science because current facts do not support their latest conspiracy theory, it's comforting that podcasts like Science Vs offers listeners well-researched facts, while unafraid to state, "we just don't know enough to be sure yet."

Check out the latest episode here.