From the very beginning, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a rollercoaster of fears and hopes, breakthroughs and setbacks. The past three years have seen scientific triumphs followed in a heartbeat by heartbreaking despair. Today, virtually no one in the world has remained untouched by the effects of this pandemic, yet we are still faced with many unknowns.

In a new commentary published this past weekend in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine, Wafaa El-Sadr, MD, MPH, MPA, founder and director of ICAP at Columbia University, joins with Ashwin Vasan, MD, PhD, commissioner of the New York City Department of Health & Mental Hygiene, and Ayman El-Mohandes, MB, BCH, MD, MPH, dean of the City University of New York Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy, to unpack some of the key issues the world faces at this juncture in the still-unfolding pandemic – from the consequences of vaccine disinformation to the ongoing health inequities that have left whole sectors of society behind.

As co-leads of the newly launched New York City Pandemic Response Institute (PRI), Drs. El-Sadr and El-Mohandes bring critical experience and perspective to our understanding of COVID-19 and where we go from here, while Dr. Vasan’s leadership of pandemic response and recovery in New York City gives him unique insight into the social and political dynamics of this historic public health threat.

“The current moment in the Covid-19 pandemic is a pivotal one,” the authors write, as they catalog both the progress we’ve made and the challenges that still loom before us.

Read the article at the New England Journal of Medicine.