The country was divided about masking, and during the first year the messages from the top were quite confusing. Political leaders disagreed on social restrictions and on vaccines, interventions that were clearly shown to save millions of lives. Unfortunately, the acceptance of public health measures such as vaccinations was highly politicized as exemplified by the fact that there were fewer vaccinations and more hospitalizations and deaths in states that are predominantly Republican versus states that are predominantly Democratic. Furthermore, our overall uptake of vaccines was less than most
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