What is herd immunity, and why are Trump officials pursuing an idea WHO calls ‘dangerous’?

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Tue, 2020-09-01 13:44 — mike kraft

What is herd immunity, and why are Trump officials pursuing an idea WHO calls ‘dangerous’? In theory, as the number of survivors with immunity increases to a certain level, the virus’s spread would slow and eventually stop. The only problem: A whole lot of people would die before that point. William Wan Washington Post

Trump administration officials are starting to move towards coronavirus policies that are in line with a “herd immunity” strategy — a controversial approach that involves deliberately allowing the coronavirus to spread to build up population resistance more quickly while protecting the most vulnerable.

In theory, as the number of survivors with immunity increases to a certain level, the virus’s spread would slow and eventually stop. The only problem: A whole lot of people would die before that point.

At a news briefing last week, World Health Organization officials called pursuing such a herd immunity strategy “very dangerous.”

“If we think about herd immunity in a natural sense of just letting a virus run, it’s very dangerous,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO’s technical lead on the covid-19 pandemic. “A lot of people would die.”

Soumya Swaminathan, WHO’s chief scientist, said focusing on controlling transmission through public health measures while scientists develop vaccines should be the primary strategy. She pointed out that “there really hasn’t been any infectious disease that has been controlled just by allowing natural immunity to happen.”

The United Kingdom pursued such a strategy early on but abandoned it when officials saw the consequences. Sweden, which pursued a similar strategy, has been heavily criticized by public health officials and infectious-disease experts as reckless: The country has among the highest infection and death rates in the world. ...

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