Look at how Anders Tegnell in Sweden has changed his tune.... calling natural herd immunity "futile and immoral" while pushing for regional lockdowns. Coronavirus: Sweden’s push for herd immunity immoral, says covid chief https://www.theaustralian.com.au/wo...f/news-story/750b732fb4ee3f8939c836f018e4b6df The pandemic is approaching a “critical juncture” in Sweden after the number of daily cases rose by 70 per cent in a week, according to the country’s chief epidemiologist. Anders Tegnell, the public face of Sweden’s official coronavirus response, said that it would be futile and immoral for a state to deliberately pursue herd immunity, where a large enough number of the population has been infected that the disease struggles to spread. “There has up to now been no infectious disease whose transmission was fully halted by herd immunity without a vaccine,” Dr Tegnell told Die Zeit, a German newspaper. Sweden’s infection rate has climbed precipitously over the past two months, rising about eightfold since the start of the autumn. It is increasing in 17 of Sweden’s 21 regions. On Tuesday Scania county, which includes the southern city of Malmo, announced a voluntary lockdown, with residents urged to avoid shops, gyms, libraries, swimming pools, meetings, public transport and physical contact with people from outside their household. “We need to press the emergency brake to stop this development now,” Eva Melander, the region’s medical director for infectious diseases, said. Overall nearly 4 per cent of coronavirus tests yield a positive result, up from 1.2 per cent in early September. “It’s one of the largest increases we have seen,” Dr Tegnell said. “Partly this is the result of more intensive tracing and testing, but we definitely also have a greater spread of infection.” (More at above url)
He learned about this in his college education...its taught in immunology 101, infectious disease 101, virology 101, bacteriology 101, medical ethics 101, masters epidemiology, first year medical school or PhD work...actually the 101 are 500 level college classes... He knew that we need a vaccine, inexpensive therapeutic drug or large % of the population to be infected / death to achieve herd immunity. Also, he knows that even with a vaccine...it may have a low effectiveness (efficacy). For example, the 2018 - 2019 Flu vaccine was only 29% effectiveness (efficacy) and the best years ever for the Flu vaccine was 2012 with a 67% effectiveness and that occurred in the United States. I posted an article in another thread about him and their prediction models in which he was surprised back in April with the numbers of infections / deaths. In that article he understood the relationship of... Increasing Infections -----> Increasing Hospitalizations -----> Deaths Dr. Anders Tegnell knew the facts Sweden and other countries are now nearing the "increasing hospitalizations" in a 2nd wave at the start of the seasonal Flu season while other countries (e.g. United States, France) are now within the "increasing hospitalizations"... Health Officials all warned about such back in April Simply, everybody now including Sweden are feeling the pressure now that the numbers are rising at the start of the seasonal Flu season. The silver lining is that the % of death is declining because hospitals are better prepare to take care of Covid-19 patients and sick patients are less sick because they've either wore a face mask, social distancing and improved hygiene (hand washing)...as in less viral load. Question now...why is he now admitting to such ? Solution - National face mask wear mandates and keep all businesses open. No lockdowns. People will tolerate a face mask wear mandate if they still have a job. wrbtrader
"Sweden's experiment with herd immunity against COVID-19 continues to deliver record breaking figures" Sweden hits highest daily COVID-19 spread as chief epidemiologist says herd immunity not 'ethically justifiable' https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-10-30/sweden-hits-highest-daily-coronavirus-case-number/12829990
So much for "natural herd immunity"... Sweden daily virus tally reaches new high https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6991371/sweden-daily-virus-tally-reaches-new-high/?cs=14232 Sweden's daily coronavirus infections have climbed to a new high while several regions advised residents to avoid public transport and venues to slow the transmission. The Swedish Public Health Agency said that 3254 cases were confirmed in the past 24 hours, a new record since the onset of the pandemic. (More at above url)
According to clowns like you Europe had everything figured out. Why are they locking down? You have been wrong on everything so far.
Let's take a look at my post on the "Europe - Lockdowns are Back" which is re-posted below to provide some proper context... ================================================================================= One immediate question should be -- If lockdowns are such a excellent way of addressing a novel pandemic then why didn't the lockdowns from spring in Europe work? How come these countries are suddenly overwhelmed with COVID cases and need to do lockdowns again? First let's note that counties such as New Zealand, Japan, Australia, and South Korea have been very successful with addressing COVID with lockdowns followed by phased re-openings with proper contact tracing and testing. In Europe, Germany has been a leader in the best pubic health response; the only country to implement with contact tracing and testing -- many German schools are testing the students every three days. Where did Europe go wrong? Fundamentally European countries opened too early and failed to implement full contact tracing and testing. The published recommendations of 5 criteria that must be met before easing lockdowns was not followed. These criteria very much follow the five points I have regularly outlined for re-opening; non-overloaded hospitals, contact tracing in place, proper testing in place, community spread reduced below 0.8, and a reduction in vectors (infected people in the community) -- however the medical criteria adds one more additional critical point - border controls -- absolutely no admission of people from COVID infected countries without strict quarantine. This failure leads Europe to where we are today with over-run hospitals, rapidly rising cases and the re-implementation of lockdowns. Germany is in the best shape comparatively to other European countries -- their failure was not having any border controls and letting nearly anyone in - now they are struggling to address the ensuing COVID problems. The bottom line: Lockdowns following the best scientific principles do work when implemented properly. They fail when a country takes any short-cuts. Nearly all European nations failed to follow best practices for re-opening after a lockdown. What does this portend for the U.S. in the upcoming weeks? The U.S. is lagging Europe by abut 4 weeks. We are already seeing new records in rising cases, hospitals in some cities are being overwhelmed, and some states are considering rolling back their phased re-openings. The winter months for the U.S. are likely to be harsh -- especially in a fractured political environment with no coordinated COVID response across the nation with every state taking their own path.
But why should anyone care. Check out the deaths. Staggering(ly low) Probably should shut the country down because cases.