Why aren't more older adults getting flu or COVID-19 shots?

Why NOT take simple, safe steps to save your life?

It's not too late to get your flu and COVID shots, and RSV as well

By University of Michigan

Edited by Sadie Harley, reviewed by Andrew Zinin

National Poll on Healthy Aging data from adults age 50 and over who replied to a poll in late December 2025 and early January 2026 saying that they had not received a flu vaccination in the last six months and/or had not received a COVID-19 vaccination in the last year, showing the main reason why they had not done so. Credit: Emily Smith—University of Michigan

This winter's brutal flu season isn't over, and COVID-19 cases have risen recently too. But a new poll taken in recent weeks shows that vaccination against both viruses lags among people 50 and over, and the national survey reveals key reasons why.

In all, the University of Michigan National Poll on Healthy Aging shows, 42% of people over 50 haven't gotten either flu or COVID-19 vaccines in the past six months, though 29% have gotten both and 27% have gotten just the updated flu shot.

The poll also asked about COVID-19 vaccination since it became available in 2021: 49% of people over 50 said it's been more than a year since their last dose, and 15% said they've never received it.

The leading reason people over 50 gave for not getting updated vaccines?

They didn't think they needed them.

In all, 28% of people over 50 who didn't get a flu vaccine in the past six months, and 29% of those who didn't get a COVID-19 vaccine in the past year or ever, gave this as the main reason.

That's despite clear evidence showing that staying up to date on both vaccines reduces the risk of serious illness and death in older adults, whose immune systems need regular "reminders" with updated vaccines tailored to recent mutations in the viruses.

Coming in second among reasons for not getting vaccinated recently were worries about the vaccines' side effects (19% for flu and 27% for COVID-19), followed by a belief that the vaccines aren't effective (18% and 19%, respectively).

Far fewer (10% for flu and 6% for COVID-19, respectively) said they just didn't think of it. A few (4% and 3%) wanted to wait, and from 1% to 4% cited time, cost, insurance, availability, or eligibility concerns.

TrumpRx Denounced as Corrupt Scheme to Line Pockets of Big Pharma—and Don Jr.

Not many but Don Junior likely to benefit

Jake Johnson

This is its actual logo. Always classy!

Donald Trump on February 5 launched a website, branded with his name, in a purported effort to help patients buy prescription drugs at lower prices.

But experts, watchdog groups, and Democratic lawmakers said TrumpRx will likely do little for consumers—or for the broader goal of bringing down exorbitant medicine costs—while further enriching Big Pharma and potentially lining the pockets of his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr.

TrumpRx.gov, launched in partnership with pharmaceutical giants, points users to direct-to-patient sales platforms hosted by drug companies to facilitate the purchase of an extremely limited selection of medications. For example, TrumpRx’s listing for Farxiga links users to AstraZeneca Direct, where patients can pay out of pocket for the type 2 diabetes medication.

Donald Trump Jr. is on the board of BlinkRx, a prescription drug platform that stands to benefit from the Trump administration’s promotion of direct-to-patient medicine sales. In December, the president’s son reportedly met with top drug company executives and administration officials responsible for regulating the pharmaceutical industry—a gathering hosted by BlinkRx.

Frank Pallone Jr. (D-NJ), the top Democrat on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said in a statement Thursday that TrumpRx “not only threatens patients’ health, safety, and privacy, but also likely includes kickback schemes designed to enrich President Trump, his family, and their friends.”

As Insurance Prices Rise, Families Puzzle Over Options

Slaves to health care costs

Lynn Arditi 

New York-based performer Cynthia Freeman, 61, has been trying to figure out how to keep the Affordable Care Act health plan that she and her husband depend on.

“If we didn’t have health issues, I’d just go back to where I was in my 40s and not have health insurance,” she said, “but we’re not in that position now.”

Freeman and her husband, Brad Lawrence, are freelancers who work in storytelling and podcasting.

In October, Lawrence, 52, got very sick, very fast.

“I knew I was in trouble,” he said. “I went into the emergency room, and I walked over to the desk, and I said, ‘Hi, I’ve gained 25 pounds in five days and I’m having trouble breathing and my chest hurts.’ And they stopped blinking.”

Doctors diagnosed him with kidney disease, and he was hospitalized for four days.

Now Lawrence has to take medication with an average cost without insurance of $760 a month.

In January, the cost of the couple’s current “silver” plan rose nearly 75%, to $801 a month.

To bring in extra cash, Freeman has picked up a part-time bartending gig.

Millions of middle-class Americans who have ACA health plans are facing soaring premium payments in 2026, without help from the enhanced subsidies that Congress failed to renew. Some are contemplating big life changes to deal with new rates that kicked in on Jan. 1.

It often falls to women to figure out a family’s insurance puzzle.

Women generally use more health care than men, in part because of their need for reproductive services, according to Elizabeth Tobin-Tyler, a professor at Brown University’s School of Public Health.

Women also tend to be the medical decision-makers for the family, she said, especially for the children.

Stephen Miller for President

She was right

Rhode Island House Considers Hit List for Invasive Plants

Removing alien invaders

By Rob Smith / ecoRI News staff

Is it time for Rhode Island to ban the sale of invasive plants?

It’s one of the bills under consideration this month as the General Assembly’s annual session gets underway.

Members of the House Environment and Natural Resources Committee heard legislation (H7071) introduced by Rep. Jennifer Boylan, D-Barrington, that bans a list of nonnative invasive plants from being imported, sold, or distributed in Rhode Island.

“We’re only one of four states without a prohibited plant sale list,” Boylan told the committee. “We’re the only state in New England without such a list.”

Invasive plant species are a growing problem in Rhode Island. A plant is considered invasive if it was introduced into a region it’s not known to be native, can reproduce and spread without human effort, and actively causes harm to native species.

Invasives, whether on land or in waterbodies, typically grow much faster than their native counterparts and crowd out natives. Unlike native species, which have native predators, invasives typically have nothing to keep them from spreading.

These invaders also have knock-on effects toward animals and insects. Native milkweed plants are the primary food source for monarch butterflies in the Northeast, but black swallow-wort, an invasive species, can be mistaken by the insects as milkweed. Butterfly larvae can’t mature due to a toxin on the swallow-wort, preventing them from becoming fully grown monarchs.

American College of Physicians condemns CDC rollback on surveillance of infectious disease

Leaves hospitals and doctors to "fly blind"

By American College of Physicians

Edited by Sadie Harley, reviewed by Robert Egan

An audit of U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) public databases found that nearly half of routinely updated federal health surveillance systems had stopped or delayed updates in 2025, raising concerns that gaps in data, particularly on vaccinations and respiratory diseases, could undermine clinical guidance, public health policy, and public trust.

The findings are published in Annals of Internal Medicine.

Researchers from Vanderbilt University, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and Boston University School of Law aimed to identify which CDC databases had unexplained pauses in updates and evaluate how common such pauses were among frequently updated CDC databases.

They reviewed the CDC's public data catalog in October 2025, examining more than 1,300 listed databases and focusing on those that had previously been updated at least monthly.

Using each database's stated update schedule, they classified whether updates were current or paused. Of the 82 databases that met inclusion criteria, 46% had halted updates, most for more than six months. The majority of paused databases tracked vaccination-related information, while others covered respiratory diseases and drug overdose deaths.

Winter storms don’t have to be deadly

Winter is not over - be prepared for the next big storm

Brett Robertson, University of South Carolina

A powerful winter storm that left hundreds of thousands of people across the U.S. without power for days in freezing temperatures in late January 2026 has been linked to more than 80 deaths, and the cold weather is forecast to continue into February. Several East Coast states are also facing a new winter storm, forecast to bring several inches of snow the weekend of Jan. 31.

The causes of the deaths and injuries have varied. Some people died from exposure to cold inside their homes. Others fell outside or suffered heart attacks while shoveling snow. Three young brothers died after falling through ice on a Texas pond. Dozens of children were treated for carbon monoxide poisoning from improperly used generators or heaters.

These tragedies and others share a common theme: Winter storms pose multiple dangers at once, and people often underestimate how quickly conditions can become life-threatening.

I’m the associate director of the Hazards Vulnerability and Resilience Institute at the University of South Carolina, where we work on ways to improve emergency preparedness and response. Here is what people need to know to reduce their risk of injury during severe winter weather.

Prepare before the storm arrives

Preparation makes the biggest difference when temperatures drop, and services fail. Many winter storm injuries happen after power outages knock out heat, lighting or medical equipment.

Start by assembling a basic emergency kit. The Federal Emergency Management Agency recommends having water, food that does not require cooking, a flashlight, a battery-powered radio, extra batteries and a first-aid kit, at minimum.

In addition to these basics, a winter emergency kit should have plenty of warm clothes and snacks to provide energy to produce body heat. National Institute of Aging

In wintertime, you’ll also need warm clothing, blankets, hats and gloves. When you go out, even in a vehicle, make sure you dress for the weather. Keep a blanket in the car in case you get stranded, as hundreds of people did for hours overnight on a Mississippi highway on Jan. 27 in freezing, snowy weather.

Portable phone chargers matter more than many people realize. During emergencies, phones become lifelines for updates, help and contact with family. Keep devices charged ahead of the storm and conserve battery power once the storm begins.

If anyone in your home depends on electrically powered medical equipment, make a plan now. Know where you can go if the power goes out for an extended period. Contact your utility provider in advance to ask about outage planning, including whether they offer priority restoration or guidance for customers who rely on powered medical equipment.

Racist Trump Denounced for Sharing Vile Video Depicting Obamas as Monkeys

Trump is truly FUBAR

Brad Reed

A screenshot of the video Trump shared

Donald Trump, a documented racist, drew swift condemnation on Friday night after he posted a video on his Truth Social account depicting former President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama as monkeys.

As reported by The Guardian, the racist depiction of the Obamas was part of a longer video that featured “false and disproven claims that ballot-counting company Dominion Voting Systems helped steal the 2020 presidential election” from Trump.

The outrage over the post was immediate, even as Trump’s racism is well known and documented over many years.

“The most foundational racist idea is likening Black people to apes,” said Howard University historian Ibram X. Kendi in a social media post. “Since humans evolved from an ape-like ancestor, racist ideas cast white people as the most evolved people and the furthest away on the evolutionary scale from apes. Racist ideas cast Black people as the least evolved people and the closest on the evolutionary scale to apes. Almost all racist ideas build on this foundational one expressed by Trump.”

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URI researchers launching local stone wall study

Natural Resources Science faculty hope to examine the environmental legacy of New England’s iconic stone walls

Kristen Curry 

An iconic New England landscape feature is now the subject of focus for URI researchers, launching a study of local stone walls. (URI Photo / Amy Mayer)

This year’s snowy winter makes New England’s iconic stone walls look even more picturesque. The sturdy markers dot our local landscape, a backdrop to yards, property lines, photos and views. But what else do they do?

Photo by Will Collette

Kathleen Carroll and Shelby Rinehart in the University of Rhode Island’s Department of Natural Resources Science are asking that question and have launched a project examining the effects of stone walls on biodiversity and ecosystem processes across New England to better understand their biological importance. They hope to solicit public interest, support and participation for this effort.

“Growing up, stone walls were all around me,” says Rinehart, a new assistant professor of watershed ecology at URI, who grew up in rural Connecticut. Rinehart runs URI’s Watershed Bio(diversity)-Funk(tion) Lab, which studies how plant and animal biodiversity can support local efforts to conserve, manage, and restore important ecosystems, like salt marshes.

New postdoctoral researcher Jamie Bucholz is working with him on this new project, looking to understand the ecosystem of stone walls. Bucholz will use what she learns about stone walls to better understand the genetic biodiversity of the species that call them home. 

New to New England, she is beginning her work by examining stone walls found across the region by utilizing RIGIS environmental data provided by URI’s Jason Parent and Elliot Vosburgh ’18 ’24. The pair created a rich data set, the Rhode Island Stone Wall Mapping Project, showing where all of Rhode Island’s stone walls exist.

Foulkes blasts McKee over Rhode Island bridge safety

From “cooking the books” to threats from Alviti

Campaign Blasts McKee Administration for Removing Bridges from Safety Reporting

Providence, RI — In response to WPRI reporting that the McKee administration cooked the books by removing more than 700 state bridges from the list to try to claim it met its safety and inspection goals, Helena Buonanno Foulkes issued the following statement:

“The McKee Administration has a pattern of putting politics over competence, and this is just the latest example,” said Helena. “You can’t cook the books and then gaslight the people of Rhode Island; Governor McKee has failed Rhode Islanders, and his dishonesty only makes it worse.

Foulkes Campaign Not Worried About “Hearing Forcefully” From Resigned McKee Admin Transportation Director

Providence, RI — Yesterday, after announcing his resignation and cooking the books to make it look like he met RIDOT’s bridge safety goal, RIDOT Director Peter Alviti posted a bizarre “open letter” on the taxpayer-funded RIDOT website. After claiming over and over again that he wasn’t fired, he ended the letter stating: “And if anyone lies or misrepresents the facts for personal gain, they will be hearing forcefully from me."

In reply, Foulkes campaign communications director Angelika Pellegrino released the following statement:

“Empty threats aside, Mr. Alviti should know there is no need to misrepresent any facts to point out that Dan McKee caused months of delay when he bungled the bid process to repair the Washington Bridge, that Director Alviti couldn’t remember the name of the safety inspector in his own agency when under oath last fall, and that Rhode Islanders have to sit in traffic daily—and will have to do so for years to come—because of the McKee Administration’s failures. ”

Most COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy linked to concerns that can be overcome, study suggests

Vaccines work, are safe and can save your life

Why not protect yourself against preventable disease?

By Lancet

Edited by Sadie Harley, reviewed by Robert Egan

Most COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy is rooted in concerns that can be addressed and effectively reduced over time, according to a new study following more than 1.1 million people in England between January 2021 and March 2022 during the COVID-19 pandemic, published in The Lancet.

The study, led by researchers from Imperial College London, found that of the participants initially hesitant about getting a COVID-19 vaccine, 65% went on to get vaccinated at least once.

The findings offer a novel perspective on the main types of vaccine hesitancy during the COVID-19 pandemic. Their potential to be reversed may help inform the targeting and messaging for future roll-outs of novel vaccines.

While vaccine hesitancy is not a new phenomenon, with WHO naming vaccine hesitancy as one of the top 10 global health threats in 2019, reduced uptake of various vaccines, including childhood vaccinations against measles and pertussis (whooping cough), remains a major public health concern.

COVID-19 vaccination roll-out began in the UK on 8th December 2020, with a phased strategy that prioritized vaccines on the basis of age and clinical need.

"We wanted to look at COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in more depth to identify groups with more persistent forms of hesitancy and their main concerns. Understanding these drivers is critical to address vaccine uptake and better control disease spread," explained lead author Professor Marc Chadeau-Hyam from Imperial College London, UK.