Today on AirTalk, we discuss the latest COVID-19 headlines. Also on the show, we break down Georgia's new voting law; discuss the legal and logistical questions of universities requiring college students to be vaccinated before stepping foot on campus; and more.
COVID-19: Vaccine Eligibility Expansions, Why CA’s Contact Tracing Efforts Didn’t Go As Planned And More
In our continuing series looking at the latest medical research and news on COVID-19, Larry Mantle speaks with Dr. Kimberly Shriner, infectious disease specialist at Huntington Hospital in Pasadena.
Today’s topics include:
Biden likely to move up vaccine eligibility for all Americans
Riverside, Calif. expands vaccine eligibility to 16 and up
Are variants stalling progress in the U.S.?
Reasons Calif. contact tracing didn’t go as planned
Are people venturing out too soon?
Are social interactions now causing anxiety?
Guest:
Kimberly Shriner, M.D., infectious disease specialist at Huntington Hospital in Pasadena
After A Year Of Distancing And Lockdowns, We’re Anxious. How Are You Coping With Social Anxiety?
As more people get a COVID-19 vaccine, the more it feels like there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. The good news: the vaccines are working! So that means things can slowly start to reopen and return to normal. While that’s definitely exciting news, why are so many of us feeling anxious?
A recent survey from the American Psychological Association found that nearly half of adults are concerned about returning to normal interactions. Experts say it’s only natural to feel some sort of social anxiety after spending a year in isolation. And health anxieties, which we’ve likely all had over the last year, only make the anxiety worse. The main thing to know is that, just like you weren’t the only one locked away in quarantine, you’re not the only one feeling anxious. Today on AirTalk, we want to hear how you’re feeling? Have you ventured out only to feel uncomfortable or anxious? What was your experience? How did you react? How are you coping? Give us a call at 866-893-5722 to share your thoughts and join the conversation.
Guest:
Diana Concannon, PsyD, dean of the California School of Forensic Studies at Alliant International University in California; she is a forensic psychologist who’s worked in crisis response for over a decade; her research interests include disaster mental health and risk assessment
We Break Down Georgia’s New Voting Law And Talk Political, Economic Impacts
The sweeping rewrite of Georgia’s election rules represents the first big set of changes since former President Donald Trump’s repeated, baseless claims of fraud following his presidential loss to Joe Biden.
Georgia has been at the center of that storm. Trump zeroed in on his loss in the state, even as two Democrats won election to the U.S. Senate in January, flipping control of the chamber to their party. The 98-page measure that was signed into law Thursday by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp makes numerous changes to how elections will be administered, including a new photo ID requirement for voting absentee by mail.
Republican supporters say the law is needed to restore confidence in Georgia’s elections. Democrats say it will restrict voting access, especially for voters of color.
Meanwhile, Major League Baseball decided to pull this summer’s All-Star Game from Georgia over this new law. The state’s governor Brian Kemp vowed to defend the measure, saying “free and fair elections” are worth any threats, boycotts or lawsuits.
We dive into what the law will do, as well as its political and economic impact on the state.
With files from the Associated Press.
Guests:
Emma Hurt, politics reporter for WABE, Atlanta’s NPR affiliate station; she tweets
Travis Crum, associate professor of Law at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri; his research interests explore the relationship between voting rights, race, and federalism
Some Universities Are Requiring Vaccinations Before Students And Staff Return To Campus. What Are The Legal And Logistics Questions?
Last week, Cornell University became the latest in a growing pool of higher education institutions to announce that COVID-19 vaccinations will be required for students to return to campus.
“Medical and religious exemptions will be accommodated, but the expectation will be that our campuses and classrooms will overwhelmingly consist of vaccinated individuals, greatly reducing the risk of infection for all,” according to a statement from President Martha E. Pollack and Provost Michael I. Kotlikoff. Rutgers University, which also recently announced a vaccine requirement, will provide exceptions. Students taking online courses will not be required to be vaccinated. Legal experts generally expect that colleges and universities can safely require students to be vaccinated, but there are a couple caveats. For one thing, the vaccines are under emergency use authorization, and access could be an issue— but by fall, these same vaccines could also receive full approval.
Today on AirTalk, we’re learning more about what vaccine requirements for colleges and universities could look like. We’ll also take a look at what local schools are considering. Questions? Give us a call at 866-893-5722.
Guests:
Luoluo Hong, associate vice chancellor for student affairs & enrollment management for the California State University (CSU); she tweets
Dorit Reiss, professor of law at UC Hastings, where her areas of expertise include vaccine law and policy, and a member of The Vaccine Working Group on Ethics and Policy, an independent, not-for-profit project that was formed to address key policy challenges associated with the testing and distribution of vaccines intended to prevent Covid-19 transmission in the United States; she tweets
Robert Turner Schooley, infectious disease specialist and co-lead of UC San Diego’s COVID-19 management program
How Researchers Were Able To Plant Memories In People’s Heads (Before Helping To Root Them Out)
It might sound like a concept out of Chris Nolan’s 2010 box-office-hit-turned-cultural-touchstone “Inception,” but researchers in Germany and the United Kingdom were recently able to successfully plant memories in the minds of study participants before going back and helping the participants identify and root out the memories.
In the study, researchers did interviews in which they convinced test subjects that they had experienced events in their childhood that they had not actually experienced, for example that they had been in a car accident when they hadn’t, or that they’d been separated from their family when they actually had not. The researchers then used different interviewing techniques to bring the participants back through their memories and help them realize that they were false. While the study was conducted in a controlled setting and it’s difficult to say given its size how applicable the findings are on an individual level, it does back up pre-existing research about how moldable human memories actually are. And this study, in fact, goes one step further in suggesting that there may be ways that we can help people identify false or misremembered memories.
Today on AirTalk, we’ll explore the study and its findings as well as what the research tells us about how memories can be influenced.
Guests:
Hartmut Blank, co-author of the study "Rich false memories of autobiographical events can be reversed” and reader in psychology at the University of Portsmouth in Southern England
Elizabeth Loftus, distinguished professor of psychological and cognitive science at the University of California, Irvine, where she also teaches in criminology, law and society department