Mayo Clinic Q&A podcast: COVID-19 taking a toll beyond patients

The Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine has received full approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and COVID-19 booster vaccines have also been approved. Welcome news as the COVID-19 delta variant wave continues to rip through many U.S. communities, exhausting and wearing people down.

"I cannot tell you the emotional toll this has taken on us as physicians and nurses and respiratory therapists, and many, many others," says Dr. Gregory Poland, an infectious diseases expert and head of Mayo Clinic's Vaccine Research Group.

"One of my colleagues said, "I walk around now and can see people with morbidities, not wearing a mask, and I can tell you what size tracheal tube they're going to need." We don't normally think like that," says Dr. Poland. "but it's illustrative of the steady 18-month drumbeat of seeing people sick and dying of something we can prevent."

In this Mayo Clinic Q&A, Dr. Poland talks more about FDA approvals for COVID-19 vaccines, goes into detail about the COVID-19 virus replication rate and he answers a listener question about the reliability of home COVID-19 tests. Dr. Poland also explains and speaks to the importance of 'cocooning' to protect, especially your newborns and toddlers.
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Information in this post was accurate at the time of its posting. Due to the fluid nature of the COVID-19 pandemic, scientific understanding, along with guidelines and recommendations, may have changed since the original publication date.

For the safety of its patients, staff and visitors, Mayo Clinic has strict masking policies in place. Anyone shown without a mask was recorded prior to COVID-19 or recorded in an area not designated for patient care, where social distancing and other safety protocols were followed.

Dr. Poland has served as a consultant for Merck & Co. Inc., Medicago Inc., GlaxoSmithKline plc, Sanofi Pasteur, Emergent BioSolutions Inc., Dynavax Technologies Corp., Genentech Inc., Eli Lilly and Co., Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc., Kentucky BioProcessing Inc. and Genevant Sciences Corp. Honoraria: Elsevier.