Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April • Hacker News Board

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#71

Post by nopzor » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:01 PM UTC

carlmr wrote: post #63

tialaramex wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The long distance travel which spreads a pandemic so fast now is predominantly a First World thing. We could and should have shut that down. A month after we knew we were in deep trouble it was still perfectly normal to decide hey this is boring I'll go on vacation to somewhere with nowhere near the capacity needed to handle COVID-19. Oh, I have a little cough, never mind if I feel sick I'll just fly home after I'm d…

>Remember this is SARS-CoV-2. Where's the mutations and endless new strains of SARS-CoV-1? There aren't any, it was eliminated in humans. I think this is only because it was contained in China before it reached the world. They had an excellent pandemic response and quashed it before it reached other countries. This time around it had spread around the world before we even heard about it. It was completely predictable…

sars definitely reached other countries outside of china..

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#72

Post by ascagnel_ » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:08 PM UTC

KaiserPro wrote: post #9

I mean thats a nice theory. The first broad point: infections are decreasing. I suspect that this might not always be because we are reaching "herd immunity". It could just be a side effect of stats. Also Vaccines in the USA will target the people who are likely to get tested. In the UK infections are decreasing because we are in a harsh lockdown. The vaccine show little to no effect _yet_ (unlike israel) As for the…

> The first broad point: infections are decreasing.

> I suspect that this might not always be because we are reaching "herd immunity". It could just be a side effect of stats. Also Vaccines in the USA will target the people who are likely to get tested.

I think the decrease of infections is more a regression to a mean -- we were seeing spikes in infection rates over the holidays (and starting a little earlier in the US, because of when we celebrate Thanksgiving) as people decided to meet friends and family indoors and unmasked. Now that the source of the spike is behind us and most cases that were part of that spike have recovered, the weekly caseload is dropping back to where it was in October and early November.

https://images.ctfassets.net/o2ll9t4ee8tq/5lcVQMPbqeYblRqbqe...

(image from the COVID Tracking Project -- https://covidtracking.com/analysis-updates/more-good-news-th...)

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#73

Post by addicted » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:14 PM UTC

saalweachter wrote: post #53

Animats wrote: post #44

The argument: In large part because natural immunity from prior infection is far more common than can be measured by testing. Testing has been capturing only from 10% to 25% of infections, depending on when during the pandemic someone got the virus. Applying a time-weighted case capture average of 1 in 6.5 to the cumulative 28 million confirmed cases would mean about 55% of Americans have natural immunity. That's far…

He also uses a fairly low estimate of IFR: > Covid-19 deaths in the U.S. would also suggest much broader immunity than recognized. About 1 in 600 Americans has died of Covid-19, which translates to a population fatality rate of about 0.15%. The Covid-19 infection fatality rate is about 0.23%. These numbers indicate that roughly two-thirds of the U.S. population has had the infection. I usually see numbers like 0.5-0.…

Even if he is correct about the IFR the conclusion he draws is completely wrong.

The 0.23 IFR would only be the current IFR. In the real world, the vast majority of the 0.15 % of the population died when the IFR was significantly higher, either due to the initial lack of understanding about the virus such as during the beginning of the pandemic, or due to the fact that even after we had a better understanding the majority of deaths across the country happened under situations where the IFR was higher due to hospitals being overloaded.

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#74

Post by Izkata » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:18 PM UTC

rawfan wrote: post #13

The author, Marty Makary, is a surgon. He does not have any expertise regarding viruses or epidemiology. He's completely ignoring all other reasons why infection might go down, the most important one being effective countermeasures, like wearing masks and social distancing. He's also ignoring that the case rates are stagnating due to the British variant. Germany is in that phase now. Cases of the British variant are…

> He's completely ignoring all other reasons why infection might go down, the most important one being effective countermeasures, like wearing masks and social distancing.

If those measures are so effective, why did they take nearly a year for an effect to be seen?

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#75

Post by tinus_hn » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:23 PM UTC

marcodiego wrote: post #36

danfo wrote: post #25

> Herd immunity has been well-documented in the Brazilian city of Manaus, where researchers in the Lancet reported the prevalence of prior Covid-19 infection to be 76%, resulting in a significant slowing of the infection. What, the linked study proves the opposite. A massive amount of death in Manaus in 2021, despite 'herd immunity' measured in October 2020. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-…

The only thing we can learn from Manaus is that waiting for herd immunity is a very bad idea.

Yeah, we better destroy the economy with lockdowns while waiting for vaccines that don’t work against these new strains, and then pay the price for herd immunity as well.

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#76

Post by gdubs » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:25 PM UTC

cheph wrote: post #34

This "pandemic" has given me permanent damage to hips, back and knees, without once having COVID, or ever meeting someone who has had COVID, or meeting someone who knows someone who has had COVID. I only know one person that knows a person who had COVID, and that person is on the other side of the planet. I would much rather have had COVID. COVID lasts some weeks, maybe months with long COVID, I have damage for the r…

That’s fortunate. But if we’re playing the anecdote game: I know two relatives who died from it this year, and a young, healthy, person who had a “mild” case and now has weird blood issues, clotting, etc.

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#77

Post by tinus_hn » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:26 PM UTC

ganafagol wrote: post #12

Note that we still don't have much data on whether and by how much vaccinations do reduce transmission. The objective of the vaccines was to minimize serious cases. But transmissions are a different story. It could easily be that the vaccine prevents serious cases in 95% of people but transmission is not impacted significantly. We just don't know yet. Why is this relevant? Because the whole concept of "herd immunity"…

And, of course the measurements are about false positives.

If you are vaccinated and then come in contact with someone who is infected, do you test positive? Nobody knows, really. And people you are in contact with? Unknown.

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#78

Post by tinus_hn » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:36 PM UTC

KaiserPro wrote: post #9

I mean thats a nice theory. The first broad point: infections are decreasing. I suspect that this might not always be because we are reaching "herd immunity". It could just be a side effect of stats. Also Vaccines in the USA will target the people who are likely to get tested. In the UK infections are decreasing because we are in a harsh lockdown. The vaccine show little to no effect _yet_ (unlike israel) As for the…

You claim lockdowns are effective because they are effective: if cases are going down without lockdown, it’s because of some unknown outside factor. If cases are going down with lockdown, it must be because of lockdown. Lockdown is both necessary and unnecessary.

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#79

Post by curlypaul924 » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 3:36 PM UTC

carlmr wrote: post #63

tialaramex wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The long distance travel which spreads a pandemic so fast now is predominantly a First World thing. We could and should have shut that down. A month after we knew we were in deep trouble it was still perfectly normal to decide hey this is boring I'll go on vacation to somewhere with nowhere near the capacity needed to handle COVID-19. Oh, I have a little cough, never mind if I feel sick I'll just fly home after I'm d…

>Remember this is SARS-CoV-2. Where's the mutations and endless new strains of SARS-CoV-1? There aren't any, it was eliminated in humans. I think this is only because it was contained in China before it reached the world. They had an excellent pandemic response and quashed it before it reached other countries. This time around it had spread around the world before we even heard about it. It was completely predictable…

> I think this is only because it was contained in China before it reached the world

Is this true? According to the CDC, there were SARS cases reported in Europe and the Americas prior to containment in China. Why was it different this time around?

Re: Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

#80

Post by statstutor » Mon, Feb 22, 2021, 4:27 PM UTC

cheph wrote: post #32

berdario wrote: post #16

I really want to see positive news, and the vaccination rollout (despite how uneven it is) is definitely positive. But the focus on herd immunity, if conflated with immunity after infection, is misleading: Look at what's happening in Manaus: https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n394 The news there are definitely sobering :( Unfortunately, the multiplication of strains of covid19 was inevitable, due to the decision of…

> Manaus shows that pursuing herd immunity through natural infection is not a guarantee. Not a guarantee of what? Are we suggesting that we have a virus here that, unlike every previous virus, we can only reach herd immunity for with a vaccine?

I don't believe there is any named virus where we have reached herd immunity without a vaccine.

Herd immunity was defined by the theory that it would prevent the spread of measles. It only did so with any measurable effect after universal vaccination was introduced.