Take Achal Bhatt, an analyst in the National Immunization Program (NIP) at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta. As Bhatt worked toward her PhD on mycobacteria, which cause tuberculosis, she became increasingly disturbed by the politics of TB inoculations.
"Some would talk about ... political pressures that prevent the people who need [vaccines] from getting them," says Bhatt, who did her graduate work at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. "It would always boil my blood. There I am doing research on a new vaccine and even the vaccines that we currently have aren't getting to the people who need them."
A National Academy of Sciences internship introduced Bhatt to data collection and advisory work in Washington, DC, that she would translate into vaccination policymaking. As a Christine Mirzayan Science and Technology Policy intern, she helped develop recommendations for US political and administrative ...
