By Ben Leonard and Chelsea Cirruzzo

With Katherine Ellen Foley 

While, overall, most surveyed voters said they'll likely get the new Covid vaccine, there's a sharp divide between Democrats and Republicans when it comes to who's willing to get the vaccine. | Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP Photo

SURVEY SAYS — Most voters say they’re likely to seek out the newest Covid-19 shot, according to new polling conducted by POLITICO and Morning Consult. The results come just days after the CDC endorsed the latest shot and amid a rise in Covid cases and hospitalizations, POLITICO’s Adam Cancryn reports.

Why it matters: The 57 percent who will “probably” or “definitely” get vaccinated signals that a sizable share of the population remains open to the vaccines, even as they increasingly become the subject of Political attacks and disinformation.

By the numbers: Nearly 8 in 10 Democrats, or 79 percent, say they’ll “definitely” or “probably” get the new vaccine. But only 39 percent of Republicans expect to seek out the updated shot, reflecting the sharp political divide that’s hampered the Covid response in recent years. The poll also found a bloc of Republicans solidly against vaccination, with 44 percent saying they “definitely” won’t get the shot. Another 17 percent say they “probably” won’t seek it out.

Only 17 percent of Americans got last year’s vaccine, according to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

New obstacles: For the first time, the federal government is ceding much of the responsibility for distributing the vaccines to the private sector, raising the risk of confusion as health providers and patients adapt to a new system. The rollout also comes as GOP presidential candidates — and Democratic candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — play up their opposition to Covid precautions. On Wednesday, Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo warned healthy adults under age 65 against taking the newly approved Covid vaccine.

WELCOME TO FRIDAY PULSE. A swarm of ducks hit Farragut Square in Washington this week. Any theories? Reach us with your theories, tips and feedback at [email protected] or [email protected]. Follow along @_BenLeonard_ and @ChelseaCirruzzo.

A message from PhRMA:

Middlemen can profit from where patients fill their prescriptions. Because insurance companies and PBMs own pharmacies, too.

TODAY ON OUR PULSE CHECK PODCAST, host Alice Miranda Ollstein talks with POLITICO global health care reporter Carmen Paun on how former President George W. Bush and a group of establishment Republicans are working to convince anti-abortion groups and conservatives to support reauthorizing the global HIV/AIDS program.

The modernization of the VA's troubled electronic health records system is getting low grades so far from some top officials at VA facilities. | Charles Dharapak/AP Photo

ISSUES PERSIST WITH VA EHR — The Department of Veterans Affairs has finished the first three-month increment of its electronic health care modernization project pause, a top VA official said Thursday, but there’s still no public timeline for the program to resume, and significant problems remain, Ben reports.

The first increment focused on planning and improving stability, said Dr. Neil Evans, the VA’s EHR project director, at a House Veterans’ Affairs Committee hearing Thursday. He repeated the VA’s pledge to publish a schedule it will stick to once the program reset ends. The program is billions over budget, delayed indefinitely and has been tied to several veterans’ deaths.

Woes remain: Dr. Meredith Arensman, a top official at a Columbus, Ohio, VA facility that’s been using the Oracle Cerner system since May 2022, said it’s offered no meaningful boost in efficiency or safety.

“Our clinicians are exhausted — sometimes tearful, and frankly distressed that they’re not able to provide the level of care that they could in 2019,” Arensman said, pointing to monthly outages. She said providers get messages from patients they’ve never seen in error weekly. Evans said Oracle Cerner and the VA are working to address the issue.

Arensman said the system’s woes could impede efforts to get veterans benefits for exposure to toxic chemicals under the PACT Act.

Other top officials at sites using the system said productivity has remained below baseline levels. Scott Kelter, director of the VA Medical Center in Walla Walla, Wash., said that, under the new system, processes that used to take six to 10 clicks now take 30 to 50.

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BERNIE MAKES A DEAL, JUST NOT WITH CASSIDY — Senate HELP Chair Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) have agreed on legislation to boost funding for primary care and alleviate workforce shortages, POLITICO’s Daniel Payne reports.

The compromise bill comes after months of hearings and negotiations in Congress on health worker shortages and primary care system gaps and increases funding far more than several earlier plans.

But the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee’s ranking member, Bill Cassidy (R-La.), opposes the measure, saying it’s “unfinished” and casting doubts on its provisions to pay for funding expansions.

What’s in it: The legislation would give $5.8 billion annually to community health centers over three years and $3 billion for construction and renovation and add 700 primary care residency slots. It would also reauthorize the National Health Service Corps at nearly $1 billion annually.

To boost the workforce, it would earmark $1.2 billion for two-year nursing education programs to increase class sizes and train 60,000 additional nurses and $300 million for primary care doctor education.

What’s next: The HELP Committee will consider the bill on Sept. 21.

DRUG SHORTAGE FIX IN QUESTION — The path forward for a House effort to address drug shortages remains unclear after an Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee hearing Thursday, POLITICO’s David Lim reports, especially amid a government-funding battle that’s overshadowing bipartisan dealmaking.

The hearing follows an unsuccessful bid by committee Democrats to convince Republicans before the August recess to add drug shortage legislation to the committee’s bill to reauthorize pandemic preparedness programs.

E&C Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) opposed policies floated by Democrats that would give the FDA new authorities, instead releasing a discussion draft in July that focuses on providing certain drugmakers exemptions from the Medicaid inflation rebate program and 340B program.

Top committee leaders indicated they’re open to working toward a bipartisan drug shortage package, but the hearing didn’t yield much clarity on what a compromise might look like.

“It has to be done this year,” E&C Health Subcommittee ranking member Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) told reporters when asked whether a bipartisan package could ride on an end-of-the-year omnibus deal.

A message from PhRMA:

HHS VS. POLITICAL INTERFERENCE — HHS plans to finalize its new Scientific Integrity policy and other initiatives aimed at preventing political meddling in health decisions early next year, according to a Government Accountability Office report, Chelsea reports.

The report, out Thursday, is the latest in an effort by the GAO to help health agencies avoid political pressure in their decision-making after allegations of such were made during the pandemic.

Background: The GAO reported in 2022 that its interviews with agency officials from the CDC, the FDA and the NIH revealed they’d observed instances of political interference that might have compromised the scientific integrity of the Covid-19 response.

Those instances ranged from the FDA’s initial emergency use authorization of hydroxychloroquine, following comments by then-President Donald Trump on its efficacy, to allegations that the political pressure led the CDC to lift its mask mandate for vaccinated people in May 2021 before reversing the decision in July 2021.

In 2022, the GAO recommended that HHS develop procedures for reporting and addressing allegations of political interference and convened a roundtable of experts to further examine how the CDC, the FDA, the NIH and the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response can further protect against interference.

According to the new report, HHS’ updated scientific integrity policy will include clear procedures for reporting and handling allegations of political interference, with a new reporting portal in the works. The department has also designated an interim scientific integrity official and is working on scientific integrity training for employees.

However, “no agency is fully insulated from political influence and there is an appropriate role for political appointees and elected officials in agency processes,” the GAO wrote in its report, which means that, while an elected official can encourage the development of a particular project, they shouldn’t be able to exert influence in a way that could compromise scientific integrity.

TRANSPLANT PROBABLY CAUSED LUNG INFECTIONS — The CDC released a report Thursday, concluding that two instances of Legionnaires disease, a severe bacterial pneumonia, were most likely complications from two lung transplants from the same donor, Katherine reports.

Two patients in a Pennsylvania hospital developed the infection in June 2022. Both had received a lung from a donor who had drowned in a river — a common environment for Legionella bacteria. One patient survived after treatment, but the other died six months after.

The CDC said the cases highlight the importance of testing lungs ahead of transplantation when a donor’s death is caused by freshwater drowning.

Hanna Hayden, previously of the Reis Group; Clare Krusing, previously of Morgan Health; John Holdsworth, most recently an intern with Reservoir Communications Group; Lauren McQuatters, previously of Syntegra; Rikki Campbell Ogden, previously of IFC/World Bank Group; and Megan Tebbenhoff, previously of the Lewin Group, have joined Reservoir Communications Group.

A message from PhRMA:

Insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) are putting their profits before your health. That’s because the largest PBMs own or are owned by the largest insurance companies, and they own pharmacies, too. First the PBM can deny coverage for your medicine in favor of one that makes them more money. Then, they steer you to the pharmacy they own. Without you ever knowing why it all happens this way. See what else they do.

The Associated Press reports on a pig kidney working for two months in a brain-dead man.

STAT reports on researchers’ work to understand how Hispanic Americans live longer than white Americans despite higher rates of obesity and lower health care access.

JOIN 9/19 FOR A TALK ON BUILDING THE NEW AMERICAN ECONOMY: The United States is undergoing a generational economic transformation, with a renewed bipartisan emphasis on manufacturing. Join POLITICO on Sept. 19th for high-level conversations that examine the progress and chart the next steps in preserving America’s economic preeminence, driving innovation and protecting jobs. REGISTER HERE.

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