As it did last year, the coronavirus pandemic dominated health care news in 2021, challenging a return to normalcy. The death toll in the U.S. alone crossed 800,000, but the availability of effective vaccines offers hope. In this post, we look back on the year’s most salient health care developments, focusing first on COVID-19 and then on other events.
- All Americans 5 and older became eligible for COVID-19 vaccines. Scientific breakthroughs in 2020 led to the development of three coronavirus vaccines. President Biden directed states to make every adult eligible for a vaccine by April 19, 2021; by the summer, supply was abundant. Unfortunately, the country fell short of Biden’s initial goal for 70 percent of American adults to receive at least one dose by July 4. Access barriers and political polarization contributed to this lag in uptake.