Even as California inches toward economic and social reopening, the virus is running rampant in other states—most notably, Michigan—and outside the U.S., in countries that have received little or no vaccine. There is increasing concern that the highly contagious variants now circulating could fuel a nationwide surge this summer.
Posted on April 19, 2021 - 1:41pm
As much as anyone in the world, Berkeley anthropology alumna Heidi Larson is confronted by public resistance to the COVID-19 vaccines. Larson is founder and director of the London-based Vaccine Confidence Project, a nonprofit that conducts global surveys monitoring public confidence in immunization programs. With the Project, Larson helps quantify vaccine approval by measuring people’s confidence in the importance, safety, and effectiveness of vaccines.
Posted on March 23, 2021 - 10:39am
California periodically touches base on the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic with John Swartzberg, a UC Berkeley Public Health Clinical Professor Emeritus and an international authority on infectious diseases and vaccinology. In October, Dr. Swartzberg was hopeful that forthcoming vaccines would be at least 70 percent effective; as it turned out, they far surpassed that figure, with both the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines approaching 95 percent efficacy.
Posted on February 23, 2021 - 1:06pm
With the CDC admitting that last year’s flu shot was a considerable bust and other emerging research challenging the shot’s efficacy, some are questioning if they should even bother. As a spritely 20-something who feels like she’s made of steel and impervious to all disease, I planned to meet in person with Dr. John Swartzberg, UC Berkeley professor of public health and Editorial Board Chair of Berkeley Wellness, to discuss the controversy.
Posted on November 30, 2016 - 1:32pm
From the peculiar to the passionate, the alarming to the inspiring, 2015 never left us at a loss for words, or story ideas.
Posted on December 30, 2015 - 1:24pm
Enacting one of the toughest vaccine mandates in the country, California Gov. Jerry Brown has signed a bill to require virtually all California school children to be vaccinated against potentially deadly diseases—or be home-schooled.
Posted on June 25, 2015 - 10:58am
As a UC Berkeley School of Public Health emeritus professor specializing in infectious diseases, John Swartzberg knows viruses as well as other people know their lapdogs. So when he gets concerned about a bug, so should you. And right now he’s pretty concerned about measles.
Posted on January 27, 2015 - 3:42pm
Pertussis continues to spread in California, with 3,458 cases reported between January 1 and June 10: In less than half a year, the toll of the sickened already has exceeded all reported cases for 2013. State health officials have now declared a pertussis epidemic—deeply worrisome, considering the bacterium* poses a particularly dire threat to infants.
Posted on June 24, 2014 - 3:25pm
Professor Arthur Reingold is Head of Epidemiology at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health
California: Is whooping cough coming back?
We certainly are having a resurgence of pertussis in the United States, although it’s never gone away. It is a threat to very young infants, particularly those too young to be vaccinated or who have not yet had a complete series of the vaccines.
Where does pertussis come from? How can you catch it?
