In response to the current crises, and underlying societal challenges, facing our country and the world, Princeton University has announced an initial series of new funding initiatives.These opportunities represent thefirst, immediate steps in an ongoing effort to bring to bear the research, teaching, and service-focused mission of the University on the critical issues raised by the global pandemic and racial injustice. Additional steps will be announced in the coming weeks and months.
The funding will support:
The Office of the Dean of the College has announced a special call for proposals for the 250th Fund for Innovation in Undergraduate Education, the Universitys principal resource for supporting curricular innovation.
For this rapid cycle of funding, and with the support of the Office of Institutional Equity and Diversity and the Office of Information Technology, the 250th Fund is accepting proposals from faculty to accomplish one (or more) of the following:
The Office of the Dean of the Faculty has announced a funding opportunity for faculty-led projects that engage undergraduate students in research or scholarly work that addresses some aspect of racism, including systemic racism, racial injustice or anti-racism.Proposals may be submitted from all faculty, including lecturers and instructors.Due to the significant disruption of employment opportunities for University students from COVID-19, student involvement in the projects is to be encouraged as a critical component.
Examples of projects could include how public policy can address systemic racism, the effects of race on poverty levels, or an art project representing racial injustice. The proposals should give a brief description (no more than two pages) of the project, including rationale and potential impact, a budget, and the faculty and (where known) the students involved.
This funding will be available immediately, and proposals will be accepted now through Aug. 31. For more information on preparing and submitting proposals, visit the Office of the Dean of the Faculty website.
In response to persistent, recent and continuing acts of systemic racism, the John H. Pace, Jr. '39 Center for Civic Engagement is launching Princeton RISE (Recognizing Inequities and Standing for Equality), a grant initiative to address inequalities and injustices. Now through June 22, all matriculated Princeton University undergraduate and graduate students can apply to receive a $1,500 grant to:
With so many students having summer internships canceled due to COVID-19, this is an opportunity for students to learn and engage in meaningful and timely work this summer. The Princeton RISE grant commitment is structured as follows:
The Pace Center is also soliciting project placements for students to address racial justice through a part-time internship or project this summer in the Princeton-Trenton area, across the United States, and internationally from community partners, faculty, staff and alumni.
For more information and application information, visit the Pace Center website.
The Princeton Mellon Initiative in Architecture, Urbanism and the Humanities, in conjunction with several campus partners, has awarded summer digital research grants that deal directly with the urban experience under COVID-19, including research that examines mobility, migration and cities during the pandemic, as well as the experience of lockdown and social distancing. Another concentration is in race, ethnicity and equity in the city: inequality and development in the Global South, black entrepreneurship, systemic discrimination in Americas urban centers, structural violence in Philadelphia, poverty and racial segregation. Many of the grants focus on ethnographic research and the study of place and space, in all parts of the globe.
The call for proposals was developed in recognition of the fact that student internships, employment and research travel were curtailed due to COVID-19. The research grants will support 71 faculty-student collaborations, and independent graduate and undergraduate student projects. Twenty-three departments and programs are represented by award recipients.
Given the number of independent research proposals and the convergence of methods exploration, the Princeton-Mellon Initiative will convene several thematic working groups and methods workshops during the summer.
To fund this research the Princeton-Mellon Initiative repurposed its spring budget and raised support from campus partners. The summer grants are made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Metropolis Project of Princeton University, the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies, the Department of Sociology, the Department of Anthropology, and the Princeton Environmental Institute.
For a list of grant projects, visit the Mellon Initiative website.
Jun 19, 2020 Jim Franco Covid-19 Updates, News
ALBANY Its been 100 days since County Executive Dan McCoy held his first COVID-19 press conference, and despite businesses opening back up and mass protests throughout the Capital District, the numbers are looking good.
But, it can be a double edged sword if you consider many states are seeing record breaking numbers of new cases.
The virus is still here. It has not gone away. Things are going in the right direction but it is still here, McCoy said while imploring people to keep following the protocols of wearing masks and social distancing. Why hasnt it spiked here now that we are opening back up and there are protests going on? Its because of you doing the right things.
As of Friday, there were 1,847 positive cases in Albany County, an increase of six. There are 138 under mandatory quarantine with 1,811 who tested positive and recovered.
Six people are in the hospital for a rate of .32 percent, which is the lowest since mid-March, the beginning of the pandemic.
The eight-county Capital District Albany, Schenectady, Rensselaer, Saratoga, Greene, Columbia, Warren and Washington began Phase III on Wednesday with restaurants having the ability to serve in-house and personal care businesses like nail and tanning salons and tattoo parlors opening their doors.
All businesses now open still have to follow the state mandated protocols like wearing masks, social distancing and sanitization.
Enforcement will fall to the localities, said Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who also gave the State Liquor Authority the power to suspend liquor licenses for businesses not following the regulations.
I know the struggle a lot of the restaurants and bars have had to come back online. To get the correct guidance. To train yourself and train workers and to train your patrons when they come in, McCoy said. Its tough, but please continue to follow the guidelines put out by the state of New York. We dont want to come in and shut you down.
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Creating a vaccine for COVID-19 is just the first step. Policy makers and manufacturers then need to make a lot of it. This week on PODCAST-19, were asking who will be first in line for the immunization. And how do we make sure its eventually available to everyone?
Dont want to miss an episode of PODCAST-19, FiveThirtyEights weekly look at what we know and what we know we dont know about COVID-19? Subscribe on your favorite podcasting app! For example, heres where to do it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
After a COVID-19 vaccine deal between four European countries and AstraZeneca, another pharma giant is reportedly in advanced talks to supply its candidate in Europe should it prove safe and effective.
Johnson & Johnson is negotiating with the European Commission to supply its coronavirus vaccine candidate if it succeeds in testing, Reuters reports. The drugmaker plans to start a phase 1/2a test next month under an accelerated timeline unveiled last week.
Beyond that, the company is involved in Operation Warp Speed in the U.S., where officials plan to start late-stage testing for the candidate in September, The Wall Street Journal has reported.
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News of the talks comes after Germany, France, Italy and the Netherlands reached a deal to secure 300 million doses of AstraZenecas potential vaccine for 750 million. That candidate is farther along in development after starting a phase 2/3 trial in May.
Both AstraZeneca and J&J have already signed development deals with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA). Under AstraZenecas $1.2 billion agreement, the drugmaker pledged 300 million doses to the U.S. starting in October. J&J also has a $456 million deal with BARDA, and it promises to scale up manufacturing alongside R&D.
Meanwhile, Sanofi CEO Paul Hudson has said that the U.S., after providing upfront BARDA funding for its vaccine work, expects early access to vaccine doses. Sanofi is also negotiating a potential access deal with Europe, a source told Reuters.
RELATED: Sanofi CEO: Upfront funding wins U.S. first access to coronavirus shot
The developments underscore regional efforts to ensure early access to COVID-19 shots ahead of a worldwide vaccination push reaching billions of people. But even as candidates race forward, signs of hesitance have emerged. A new survey showed only half of Americans plan to get a COVID-19 vaccine, and many are uncertain.
Meanwhile, experts have raised warnings about vaccine nationalism and have said wealthy nations' deals to secure doses threaten poorer countries. AstraZeneca, to address that concern, has inked deals with global groups and the Serum Institute of India to provide shots in low- and middle- income countries.
A doctor lifts a vial containing a potential vaccine for Covid-19 in Gaithersburg, Md. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds / AFP via Getty Images)
EDITORS NOTE: The Nation believes that helping readers stay informed about the impact of the coronavirus crisis is a form of public service. For that reason, this article, and all of our coronavirus coverage, is now free. Please subscribe to support our writers and staff, and stay healthy.
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Within weeks, President Donald Trump is expected to announce a short list of promising Covid-19 vaccine candidates. As part of its Operation Warp Speed program, the Trump administration has given Big Pharma billions of dollars to expedite vaccine development, but provided little assurance that corporations will not profiteer. This raises a crucial question: If we get a safe and effective vaccine, will everyone be able to afford it?Ad Policy
The idea that some people would not receive a vaccine was once unthinkable. In a now legendary story, Jonas Salk developed the polio vaccine in 1955and then gave it away for free. An interviewer once asked Salk who owned the patent for his polio vaccine. He responded, Well, the people, I would say. There is no patent. Salk was incredulous. Could you patent the sun?
Since then, pharmaceutical corporations have patented the medical equivalent of the moon and the stars. Patent monopolies have fueled the current drug pricing crisis, and they may block access to any future Covid-19 vaccine.
Consider the case of Moderna, the biotechnology company developing a short-listed vaccine with the National Institutes of Health. Moderna brags about its broad and deep patent estate on its website. The company has been granted over a hundred patent monopolies globally. If its vaccine proves safe and effective, Modernas monopolies will allow the corporation to set an exorbitant price. Monopolies will also allow Moderna to block other manufacturers from supplying the vaccine. It could throttle supply. The decision would rest with Stphane Bancel, the CEO of Moderna.
Will Bancel be a hero like Salk? Salk refused a monopoly and trained scientists around the world to shore up supply. Bancel, on the other hand, has watched as Wall Street investors pumped his corporations stock price and made him a billionaire. Bancel has vaguely pledged to set a price in line with other respiratory vaccineswhich cost up to $800and flatly said, We wont have enough supply at the global level. Despite this, Bancel has refused to relinquish his corporations monopolies.
The public should get a say. Like Salk, Bancel has benefited greatly from public dollars. His corporation received millions in funding as early as 2013 to help develop its new way of making vaccines. Federal scientists helped design the new Covid-19 vaccine and are now running the critical human tests. The government also just gave $483 million to scale manufacturing. The public is paying at every stage for this potential vaccineand so many others. All five candidates Trump is expected to short-list have benefited from public funding.
Fortunately, we do not have to wait for Big Pharma to find it in its heart to be benevolent. We can force executives to be like Salk. The US government has the authority, under existing law, to break patent monopolies. In exchange for a modest royalty, the government can and should allow any manufacturer to produce promising Covid-19 medicines. The government threatened to use the approach to lower prices for a critical antibiotic when letters containing anthrax spores were sent to media outlets and the offices of Democratic Senators Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy in 2001. The government should also require companies to share know-how, and ramp up public production for promising medicines. All contracts should safeguard affordability and availability for all.Current Issue
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The pharmaceutical industrys principal objection to this approach would be its potential impact on innovation. We understand the need for medical innovation more than most. One of us was diagnosed at age 32 with ALS, a debilitating disease with a life expectancy of three to four years after diagnosis. The industry claims that without extravagant rewards, there would be no extravagant effort. But that story ignores just how deeply corporations like Moderna rely on public science. The National Institutes of Health alone spends $41 billion annually advancing medical research. Congress has appropriated billions more for Covid-19 work. Yet the corporations who benefit from this investment will be under no obligation to act in the public interest.
When Salk developed the polio vaccine, President Dwight Eisenhower said he was a benefactor to mankind. His work was in the highest tradition of selfless and dedicated medical research. Salk taught us that vaccines belong to the people.
It is time we claim them as ours.
Can a vaccine be an October surprise? Are journal publishers running a racket? And why is genetics so white?
We discuss all that and more this week on The Readout LOUD, STATs biotech podcast. First, we run through a busy week in news, discussing the results of a major study on Covid-19 treatment, an escalating fight in the publishing world, and the drug industrys biggest-ever IPO. Then, physician and health care policy expert Ezekiel Emanuel joins us to discuss his nightmare scenario: President Trump, desperate for re-election, forces the approval of an ineffective coronavirus vaccine. Finally, we talk to geneticist Tshaka Cunningham about the deep racial inequities in the field of genomics and what can be done to correct them.
For more on what we cover, heres the news on a potential Covid-19 treatment; heres more on the the fight over academic publishing; heres a look at inequality in genetics; and heres the latest in STATs coronavirus coverage.
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And if you have any feedback for us topics to cover, guests to invite, vocal tics to cease you can emailreadoutloud@statnews.com.
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You have weight loss and stomach pains for more than a week. Worried that you might be sick, you go to the doctor to find out what could be causing it. Instead of asking questions, examining, and running tests, the doctor jumps to the best-case scenario its just some indigestion and it will go away. You are sent home without any advice about what to do or what to watch for.
Sounds crazy, right? Had I treated patients that way in my 25 years of medical practice, I would certainly have been sued for malpractice and maybe even lost my medical license.
Unfortunately, this, in a nutshell, is the current federal response to the coronavirus crisis: pinning hopes on a best-case scenario against evidence to the contrary.
With more than 20,000 new cases and more than 700 new deaths each day from COVID-19, some of our most powerful national leaders are touting a highly uncertain best-case scenario the discovery of vaccines or medications while willfully ignoring the pandemic-controlling options in front of us.
Like an overly optimistic doctor, some policymakers are banking on a future vaccine that, at best, may arrive in 2021 while people are sick and dying now and the economy continues to be hobbled with an unclear path forward to stability.
The tragedy is that there is a playbook that can reduce the number of cases and deaths right now a national program to test, trace and isolate people who are infected. Increasing evidence shows that this coronavirus can be beaten back if everyone follows simple rules while in public: wearing masks, staying at least six feet away from others and avoiding indoor crowds.
Other countries, like Germany, which locked down for eight weeks and brought new cases down from more than 6,000 per day to around 500 a day, have followed this playbook. By employing these basic public health practices, they have enabled their economies to restart safely.
If we want the same results here, our leaders have to focus on what we know is possible right now. They need to consider that a quickly available, highly effective vaccine could be just a mirage on the horizon. That any new treatment could be insufficient. That this disease, now established nearly everywhere in this country, could keep spreading and causing deadly outbreaks for years.
Refusing to acknowledge and plan for these events and clinging to the rosiest outcome increases the likelihood we will end up in a worst-case scenario one where ongoing infections and outbreaks continue to pose deadly risks; fear of infection makes consumers unwilling to return to shopping and traveling; and infections and deaths overload our hospitals and mortuaries. Aside from the terrible danger to American lives, the continuing costs for private insurers and the government in treating COVID-19 patients would be enormous.
It is not too late for us to avoid the worst-case scenario by facing it now. We need a far more comprehensive program of state-based testing and contact tracing that is well-supported by federal government. Congress already has legislation that deals with testing and contact-tracing programs. Federal agencies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services should work together to assist states in collecting, analyzing and reporting data. The CDCs Epidemic Intelligence Service officers have the knowledge and experience to make this happen.
We cant sit around waiting for vaccines and treatments. They are only part of a whole package of steps to save ourselves and our economy. Our window of opportunity is closing. In nearly half of the states, new cases are rising rather than declining. If COVID-19 cases surge above the current level of 20,000 per day, it will be even more difficult and more costly to bring the disease under control and get the economy running. We can work toward a vaccine and a cure even while we take steps to drive new cases and deaths down as New York and New Jersey have done.
When my patients sought care, they also came looking for hope. Even in the most dire health crises, I could offer that. Not because I focused on the best-case scenario, but because they knew I was also planning for the worst outcome, leaving no stone unturned to help them get better.
The American public deserves the same professional commitment from all of our leaders. Action now will minimize the risks to the public and also minimize the economic pain while scientists develop the medications and vaccines that will help keep all of us healthy.
Eric Schneider is a physician and senior vice president for policy and research at the Commonwealth Fund.
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HHS looking at early 2021 for COVID-19 vaccine; telehealth is here to stay Healthcare Finance News
