Jason G. Newland, MD, MEd

2023 Dean’s Impact Award Recipient

Jason G. Newland, MD, MEd, served as the public “face” of the pediatric COVID-19 pandemic for the St. Louis metropolitan area, and his work exerted impacts well beyond the region. First, as the COVID-19 threat emerged globally, he pivoted the infrastructure of his SHARPS Network (comprising 70+ children’s hospitals sharing information on antimicrobial use and resistance) to become the hub for national conversations among pediatric infectious disease groups about COVID-19 testing, quarantine and school attendance. Together, Newland, Rachel C. Orscheln, MD, and David A. Rosen, MD, PhD, distilled these conversations into algorithms for school administrators and nurses to manage cases. Second, with the help of NIH P50 and CDC OTA grants, he performed extensive community-engaged research, collecting thousands of student nasal swabs over a year to pinpoint the epidemiology of COVID-19 spread within schools in underserved areas of St. Louis. This provided evolving foundational data informing schools’ management of COVID-19 and enabled students to get back to the classroom faster. Third, he served as site principal investigator for pediatric trials of the Moderna COVID-19 mRNA vaccine at Washington University. In total, Newland has published 16 papers on COVID-19, many of which served as or informed national guidelines at different stages of the pandemic. Finally, Newland undertook innumerable media opportunities, with the sometimes difficult and stressful goal of providing the St. Louis community with scientifically accurate, practical advice and information. Despite these challenges, Newland maintained a straightforward, professional, down-to-earth approach that effectively delivered timely and accurate messaging to patients and families.