| Dear readers,
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a long-time vaccine skeptic, is now at the helm of the nation's health and human services department, and the future of vaccines in the U.S. has become unpredictable.
"We don't know what's going to happen and what's going to change," Dr. Kristen Panthagani, a third-year emergency medicine resident and science communicator, told me.
At The Journalist's Resource, we strive to provide reporters with research-based primers and tip sheets. So, I decided to write a piece that explains in detail what research shows about the safety, effectiveness and side effects of childhood vaccines. The result is a 5,600-word reference guide. You can borrow from it when you need to or republish parts or all of it, as long as you adhere to a few basic guidelines.
In the piece you will find the following resources: - 5 quick tips when reporting on vaccines.
- What's known about vaccine safety.
- Common vaccine side effects.
- How vaccine side effects are tracked in the U.S.
- A list of childhood vaccines along with their safety and side effects, based on what large systematic reviews and meta-analyses have found.
- More resources for reporting on vaccines.
These are unsettling times for many scientists, doctors and health journalists who have long relied on information from federal agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration for their work. Some pages and data tools have been taken down, so have some research studies.
So, before closing this week's newsletter, I wanted to acknowledge the mental toll of the current non-stop news cycle on journalists. For me, it's reminiscent of the pressures of covering the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, but at a larger scale and in all directions. Please don't forget to take care of yourself. Take short breaks. Do a few jumping jacks. Do a little dance. Pick up the phone and call a friend, or better yet, plan a Sunday brunch. We have a list of more practical tips to help you care for yourself.
Listen to Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer Ed Yong talk about burnout in his recent interview with The New York Times. Don't ignore the signals your body is sending you. And read this 2024 Poynter article by Kristen Hare.
For dealing with uncertainty in this chaotic world, a great piece of advice recently arrived in my inbox via author and journalist Oliver Burkeman's insightful newsletter, The Imperfectionist: "[A]s far as you can manage it, you should make sure your psychological center of gravity is in your real and immediate world – the world of your family and friends and neighborhood, your work and your creative projects, as opposed to the world of presidencies and governments, social forces and global emergencies."
I'm immensely grateful for your hard work. Please take good care.
Naseem Miller
Senior editor for health at The Journalist's Resource |
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