Vaccine News & Notes — April 2023

Essay contest for students in grades 6 through 12

It’s that time of year again! The Vaccine Education Center’s school-based program, called the Vaccine Makers Project, is hosting our annual essay contest for students in middle and high school. Known as the "Maurice R. Hilleman Student Essay Contest," this opportunity is available to students in grades 6 to 12* in the U.S. and Canada. Entries must be received by June 9, 2023. To find this year’s writing prompt, application and rules, go to HILLEMANFILM.com.

*grades 6-11 in Quebec

COVID-19: Yes, masks work, and no, it wasn’t a lab leak.

Two outstanding “controversies” surrounding COVID-19 and the pandemic keep coming back to the headlines — the usefulness of masks and how the pandemic started. While media outlets benefit from revisiting these questions because it gives them content, most people just end up with mixed signals and figure that no one knows for sure. However, these questions are not controversial in the scientific community.

Masks work

Check out this blog post from Those Nerdy Girls, a group of female scientists who answered common questions throughout the pandemic. After describing the latest media rounds related to masks and examining the data, Those Nerdy Girls conclude, “Despite noise to the contrary, there is good evidence that masks are effective in reducing the risk of transmission and infection of COVID-19.”

Find out more:

• Go to the post about masks.
• “Meet” Those Nerdy Girls.
• Sign up for their newsletter.
• Check out their “nerdy merch.”

SARS-CoV-2 did not come from a lab

Pandemic viruses typically jump from an animal to humans (known as a “spillover event”), but one of the missing pieces of information about how SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, made the leap was knowledge related to which animal might have incubated it before it started infecting humans. This limitation of existing knowledge, coupled with a lack of transparency and cooperation by the Chinese government, allowed for a “lab-leak” theory to gain steam.

Recently, however, more data have suggested that raccoon dogs are the source. To read up on these recent findings and see why most scientists close to the matter agree that the COVID-19 pandemic started like most other pandemics — from a spillover event, not a lab leak — check out these articles:

• The Strongest Evidence Yet That an Animal Started the Pandemic, The Atlantic, March 16, 2023.
• Interview with Worobey, Andersen & Holmes: The Lab Leak, Decoding the Gurus, Episode 67, March 11, 2023
• Spillover market with Michael Worobey, This Week in Virology, Episode 876, March 17, 2022.
• The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan was the early epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic, Science, July 26, 2022.