Coronavirus vaccine and Delta variant updates for 8-13-2021

<p>This is Vaccine 411, the latest coronavirus vaccine information for August 13th, 2021.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>The Department of Health and Human Services is the latest federal agency requiring employees who provide care or services for patients be vaccinated. That affects more than 25,000 clinicians, researchers, contractors, trainees, and volunteers.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>The Supreme Court said yes, universities can impose a vaccine mandate on students and faculty. It declined to block a mandate at Indiana University or provide emergency relief requested by some students who said the mandate violates their constitutional right to bodily integrity under the 14th Amendment.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>A vaccine sentiment survey by Verywell Health shows 27% of vaccinated respondents said they were previously against getting the vaccine. So the important question is, what was able to change their minds? The top reason—chosen by 40%—was the risk of COVID overtaking the risks of getting vaccinated. Other converts just needed some time to warm up to the idea.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Vermont, as you hear almost every day in this podcast, has the highest vaccination rate in the country. Yet cases in the state rose 245% in the past two weeks, according to a Fortune analysis of New York Times data. That’s the highest increase in the country over that period. The state is still among those with the lowest cases per capita. And, of course, the messaging on the vaccines has shifted from it will help you keep from getting infected to it will mitigate the severity of your COVID case.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>We have gone from anyone who thinks the virus leaked from a lab in China is a conspiratorial nutcase to it’s a “likely hypothesis.” And that characterization comes from the head of the World Health Organization’s investigation. Dr. Peter Embarek said their team was forced to conclude a lab leak was "extremely unlikely" in their official report to avoid conflicts with the Communist Chinese government.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>In the United States cases w