Alex Smith
Alex Smith began working in radio as an intern at the National Association of Farm Broadcasters. A few years and a couple of radio jobs later, he became the assistant producer of KCUR's magazine show, KC Currents. In January 2014 he became KCUR's health reporter.
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New cases and hospitalization in the Kansas City area continue to climb, even as the statewide spike shows signs of slowing.
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The Pfizer vaccine is free and safe for 12-to-17 year olds, but teen vaccinations in Missouri are far behind other groups in the state.
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Missouri now has over 1,000 COVID cases per day, an infection level not seen in months.
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Data collection for race and ethnicity vary among states, complicating efforts to distribute COVID-19 shots to all groups. In Missouri, health officials have questioned the data's usefulness.
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To avoid racial or ethnic disparities in vaccination rates, health officials are doing outreach. But demographic data quality varies between states. In Missouri, there are errors they can't quite fix.
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Absent statewide mandates, local communities should continue to use preventive measures to ensure safe working conditions, an expert said.
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Excess deaths in Missouri well exceeded the official count of residents killed by the coronavirus.
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Polling suggests that attitudes and misunderstandings among political conservatives and people with limited health care coverage may pose the biggest challenges to mass vaccination.
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While outsiders blame low rural vaccination rates on vaccine hesitancy, local health officials say the state’s distribution system has made providing shots difficult.
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The Missouri health department has acknowledged that it has used national data to estimate Missouri’s racial breakdown, rather than data based on the state's population. That information has been a source of frustration for local health officials working to ensure that vaccine distribution is equitable. State officials now plan to use 2019 U.S. Census data from Missouri but say some parts of the data remain problematic.