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Sunburn — The morning read of what’s hot in Florida politics — 3.1.21 With apologies to the late, great Tim Russert … The top three issues facing the 2021 Florida Legislature are COVID, COVID, COVID. It’s no surprise that just about everything that will happen during the 60-day Session will be directly or indirectly related to the pandemic or influenced by the countless ways it has changed life in our state. From health care policy to the budget, from education policy to the environment, the Session will seem like all COVID-19, all the time. Even where legislation do...

February 25, 2021 6:06 AM By Brandon Lee Xavier Becerra, President Joe Biden’s pick to lead the Health and Human Services Department, assured lawmakers yesterday that as HHS secretary he’d build on the existing private sector insurance scheme in the U.S. rather than push for Medicare for All. When he was a member of the House, Becerra championed the federal government-operated health-care program that would cover all Americans, in a shift that would effectively wipe out the private-sector health insurance industry. “The most important thing is to give everyone in th...

Pfizer details ‘multiple steps’ it’s taking to study booster shots against variants Updated Feb 25, 2021; Posted Feb 25, 2021 A vial of Pfizer and BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine is seen at Northwell Health at Long Island Jewish Medical Center during a press conference in Queens, New York on December 14, 2020. - . (Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images/TNS)TNS Facebook Share Pfizer Inc. and partner BioNTech SE have begun a clinical study to see if a third shot of their existing Covid-19 vaccine can stimulate stronger immune responses against new variants. The clinical trial will examine s...

February 22, 2021 6:09 AM By Brandon Lee Nearly a month after U.S. vaccination campaigns ramped up to give Covid-19 shots to more than a million people a day, their second doses are coming due, straining state rollouts and leaving some without complete immunizations. In Texas alone, almost 6,000 people were overdue for their second shots in early February. In Washington state, health officials said last week that some mass vaccination clinics would be delivering follow-up doses only. A Michigan hospital system canceled last-dose appointments for the past week after its supply was ...

New virus variants raise alarm Filling syringes with vaccines at Fenway Park in Boston (Getty) What happened Even as the U.S. saw a continuing steep drop in Covid-19 cases this week, health officials expressed growing concern about the accelerated spread of new coronavirus variants and their resistance to vaccines’ protection. Maryland and South Carolina reported five cases of the South Africa variant, or B.1.351, which has overwhelmed South Africa and spread to at least 32 countries—and appears to be reinfecting people previously sickened with Covid. The B.1.1.7 strain, or U.K. var...