New preprint reporting a large piece of work by Katherine Jia to define estimands and estimators for direct impact of vaccines with arbitrary rollout schedules arxiv.org/abs/2509.05508 with Alyssa Bilinski, @chrisboyer.bsky.social and me

New paper: we argue that a promising approach for studying mpox vaccine effectiveness in Central Africa to incorporate mpox vaccination + testing data into existing cohort studies, especially those for HIV/STIs. www.thelancet.com/journals/ebi...

Very pleased to share this newly published work with Aishani Aatresh, part of her exceptional Harvard undergrad thesis. journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/... .

Check out "Are We Prepared for the Next Pandemic?"- CCDD Director, @mlipsitch.bsky.social's conversation with Sam Harris, host of the Making Sense podcast. www.samharris.org/podcasts/mak...

Republicans, before you vote to close 1 of 4 nursing homes, can you update us on where those people will go? Maybe call a few seniors in your state and go over plans for where they go next? Or call the son whose dad has dementia and tell him how he can be a full-time caregiver?

A new study by Julia Deichmann, @mlipsitch.bsky.social and collaborators at the Sheba Medical Center, Israel uses mathematical modeling to predict antibody kinetics and duration of protection against SARS-CoV-2 following vaccination using sparse serological data. Read it here at bit.ly/43XY9mK

New tool for pangenome analysis! CLARC refines bacterial gene clusters using functional annotation + linkage—not just sequence. New publication by @indragon.bsky.social & collaborators, advised by @mlipsitch.bsky.social & @billhanage.bsky.social. Read more at bit.ly/4ek0Y51

Deeply affecting article by an @hsph.harvard.edu PhD student denied the opportunity to graduate due to blanket exclusion of Sierra Leone citizens by the US Government. A very particular example of pointless cruelty by the US Government. www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Remarkable open letter to the director from NIH staff on the health, financial,academic freedom, and other impacts of changes at the agency. www.standupforscience.net/bethesda-dec...

The goal is plainly and literally to cut the number of people involved in basic science in the US by 70%

"The policy’s narrow-mindedness will make America small again.” I am simply at a loss to express how stupid this is. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/30/b...

Great piece by @hsph.harvard.edu colleague Maitreyi Mazumdar about how NIH's evisceration of overseas research collaborations harm the US as well as the partner countries www.bostonglobe.com/2025/05/29/o...

Worth noting: we previously projected that if pregnant individuals been vaccinated at the same rate as age- and state-matched women, we would have averted 20% of maternal COVID-19 deaths (i.e., 8% of ALL maternal deaths) from March-November 2021. doi.org/10.7326/ANNA...

The Department of Health and Human Services has a process for making and updating recommendations like this, using expert scientists and clinicians. RFK is deliberately putting Americans' health at risk and sidestepping good science for political reasons.

The Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) Program was central in improving the evidence base for health policies and interventions, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa and Central & Southern Asia - figure by @aasli.bsky.social. Our preprint on the termination of the DHS Program: osf.io/preprints/so...

I'm a current Harvard graduate student and I found out today that I had my NSF GRFP terminated without notification. I was awarded this individual research fellowship before even choosing Harvard as my graduate school

Please consider a comment today if you are in the US. See the advice (shared from an email I received) in the follow-up posts below this one. Tomorrow is the deadline. This is an important part of scientific freedom in this country.

Time Sensitive: Public comment on Schedule F (removing civil service protections for many federal employees INCLUDING THOSE WITH AUTHORITY OVER GRANTS) ends tomorrow. Notice is here: www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/... . Comment here (green button) www.federalregister.gov/documents/20... .

An easily overlooked consequence of research funding cancellations: completed research these days requires hundreds to several thousand dollars to be published due to publication fees from journals. Without support for these fees many pieces of scientific work will be near invisible.

This is pure authoritarianism. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/21/u...

🎓 The GOP’s reconciliation bill is a direct hit on higher ed: – $351B in cuts education & workforce programs – eliminating subsidized student loans – Taxes on scholarships & endowments – & more. ACE calls it a “full-out assault” on access to college. Read below ⬇️ www.acenet.edu/News-Room/Pa...

Proposed cut to NIH for fiscal 2026- $18 billion www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/u...

Important public service reporting from @statnews.com on how people are getting their NIH grants reinstated www.statnews.com/2025/05/19/r...

Given that there are 435 voting members of Congress, I would have hoped for more than 25% of House members to support American innovation in science and technology. 112? That’s it? No one else wants answers?!?!

Looking for examples of beautiful, controversial or impactful microbial modelling papers - ideally a mixture of the above! It’s for teaching in the context of microbial eco/evo/epi. The modelling should be relatively easy to understand for a master’s student with a biology background.

Love this initiative!

Breaking: Over 150 college presidents across the country just signed a letter condemning the Trump administration’s threats to dictate their policies. “We speak with one voice against the unprecedented government overreach now endangering American higher education.”

New Brief Report out in @pnas.org with Katherine Budeski: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... Focusing a virus risk ranking tool on prediction -- highlighting the importance of training models for viral emergence only on data available before emergence has happened.

1. For the past thirty years I've had the best job in the world. 
I've had the opportunity to follow my curiosity; explore the workings of nature and society; mentor students and junior colleagues in the same process; and teach generations of students about it all.

College Republicans: "Women, amirite?" "Wait, you hate women? I hate blacks! We have so much in common!" "Wou guys hate women and blacks? I hate the capital gains tax!" "Bro!" College Democrats: "Well actually, your expression of solidarity for trafficked migrants failed to acknowledge...."

BREAKING: The House will vote on the SAVE Act today. If this bill becomes law, millions of American citizens could be blocked from voting. 1/

I've already had two federal grants terminated and face a 33% pay cut due to future terminations. It's painful, but not as painful as the conversations I'm having every day with brilliant trainees in graduate school and postdoctoral positions who see little future for themselves in US science.

New commentary on pandemic surveillance and the need to have it be repeatable/continuous for updating, out in @pnas.org with Freya Shearer of Uni Melbourne: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

New preprint on how to approach antimicrobial use and resistance from a causal perspective led by Juan Gago and @cboyer.bsky.social @ccdd-hsph.bsky.social www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...

New preprint by Hanage lab researchers Ilan Rubin, Mary Bushman, and Dr. @billhanage.bsky.social, with Dr. @mlipsitch.bsky.social: Seasonal forcing and waning immunity drive the sub-annual periodicity of the COVID-19 epidemic. Available at bit.ly/4htOSX1

AAI encourages members and friends of #immunology to #StandUpforScience on March 7. Join the rally in Washington, D.C., or participate in the National Day of Action to uphold the integrity of science, protect its accessibility, and ensure its benefits serve all people! standupforscience2025.org

This is dangerous and frankly anti-democratic. This is not how a healthy democracy functions. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/06/u...

If Republicans in Congress want to help make our country safe, I have some ideas for them.

Boston doesn’t listen to kings.

Mayor @mayorwu.boston.gov told the truth to a congressional committee yesterday and made me proud to be a Bostonian and proud to have such a great mayor www.boston.com/news/local-n...

🔥 Meirav Solomon KILLS IT, placing responsibility for antisemitism exactly where it belongs: "it is not student protesters, but the bloody legacy of Pittsburgh and Poway, Charlottesville and the Capitol riots... Trump has highlighted and platformed neo-Nazis and white supremacists."

I just joined APHA bit.ly/3tPy1KU -- a strong advocate for public health right now. Encourage others to do the same!

This should be really interesting.

Follow the whole @harvardchanschool.bsky.social Starter Pack here bsky.app/starter-pack... Including @causalab.bsky.social , @harvardcchange.bsky.social , and numerous faculty.

Thrilled that this work by Lerato Magosi with many colleagues is now out as a preprint www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1.... It suggests results from treatment-as-prevention HIV cluster-randomized trials are lower than many expected due to significant "spillover" of infections from untreated communities

From @harvardchanschool.bsky.social on a point often forgotten in the discussion on regulating risky research: very little evidence to date that it actually helps public health hsph.harvard.edu/news/little-.... For details see academic.oup.com/jid/article/... and www.cidrap.umn.edu/avian-influe...

A terrific new review, super useful for getting a sense of the broad field and existing techniques, with good ideas about future directions.

New Orleans steps up. We need to support them.

"Medical societies can speak out," Georges Benjamin, MD, executive director of the American Public Health Association, said... "The nursing societies can speak up. The hospital association can speak up. This is going to create business -- tragic business -- for the hospitals."

Great interview w Gerry Epstein undark.org/2024/12/20/i... on need for oversight of non-USG funded pandemic pathogen enhancement research