Oral Defense

Danny Lutkauskas
 Ideation

Why?

● With the pandemic being Covid relevant I questioned myself does Covid-vaccines really decrease the amount of covid deaths?

Titles

● COVID-19 Vaccination Coverage and Intent Among Adults Aged 18-39 Years - United States, March-May 2021. MMWR: Morbidity &
Mortality Weekly Report

● Decreases in COVID-19 Cases, Emergency Department Visits, Hospital Admissions, and Deaths Among Older Adults Following the
Introduction of COVID-19 Vaccine - United States, September 6, 2020-May 1, 2021. MMWR: Morbidity & Mortality Weekly Report,

● Preferences for COVID-19 vaccine distribution strategies in the US: A discrete choice survey.

● Analysis of the Effectiveness of Face-Coverings on the Death Rate of COVID-19 Using Machine Learning. 

● Effects of COVID-19 Vaccination Timing and Risk Prioritization on Mortality Rates, United States. Emerging Infectious Diseases, 27(7),
1976–1979
Next year
● Next year in my opinion I feel I should gather more articles to have even more background knowledge on my topic to easily justify and
answer any questions.
 Research

Article summary

● An article from my trifold can be summarized by having science and data from Covid vaccine can be proven effective on
combating the virus.

Lit Review

● In my opinion without the literature review I would not be able to find these articles. Based on this I feel the lit review is an
extremely helpful tool to keep things organized.

Next Year

● Next year I will continue what I did this year since I incorporated more information than last year and used my time wisely.
 Procedure

Description

● Gathered government websites and jotted down the information in my science fair notebook.

Challenges

● No challenging challenges were in action during this project.

Easier way to manage procedure

● Identify key components and do test run to make sure the procedure is understandable.
 Paperwork

Challenges with Lit review? GSEF paperwork? Research Journal? Trifold?

● No big challenges arose but there was some “iffy” situations with GSEF and research journal. Some of my
paperwork for GSEF wasn’t checked off by my sponsor and I would sometimes misplace my journal.

Tips for Freshman

● Take digital pictures of your journal just in case you lose it and make sure every single form you submit is checked
off so there isn’t any doubt.
 Science Fair!

Conclusion

● I concluded there was a decrease in Covid deaths as more vaccines were distributed to the public.

Science Fair Experience

● I unfortunately did not get to experience science fair in person due to personal family matters. But in my opinion
what I need to work on is expanding more knowledge to one understand my topic and to have a good presentation.
Reflection for E-portfolio

My hypothesis was correct as I kept analyzing the numbers for my project. Covid being a relevant topic I
thought would expand my knowledge of what is going around in the real world. After grading I learned what I
should look into next time if I continue this project. Some of those are analyzing the deaths of covid mixing with
diseases like pneumonia. Including expanding my knowledge of other factors like overall spread and more
information about the vaccine distribution. Despite this, I chose this pathway because Covid was a very
popular topic and I honestly was extremely curious if vaccines played any role in the number of deaths due to
Covid.