herd immunity happens at much lower levels when you the high risk vaccinated and the low risk having natural immunities. In many areas of the US we are now very close to combo herd immunity. As the article I posted explains... parts of Northern Texas are very close to those levels right now. So as I think about it... there is an interesting gap... as more people get vaccinated there will be fewer unvaccinated low risk who have been exposed... therefore their antibodies may decrease over time. Sort of what happens during lockdowns. You lose the benefits of the built up natural immunities in you low risk... highly exposed / networked people.
There will be no herd immunity, because both Pfizer and Moderna say now that we will need booster shots every six months because of new variants. And because the new variants are so deadly and virulent, we must stay masked, because every subset of the population that is not boosted will pose a risk to the unboosted. This is going to perpetuate for decades. It is called a "money grab", and it is unprecedented. If there was ever a name for a new generation, it started on Jan 1st, 2020. It will be called, mark my words, the "COVID generation."
Virus' have been eradicated before. Polio, for example. How? Because everyone did what needed to be done. When large numbers of people don't want to participate, then the virus not only lives on, it then has a chance to mutate into something worse, and render previous vaccines less effective. So, as long as there are geniuses walking around, who think that they are smarter than centuries of data, and modern computer models, and today's bonafide experts; yeah, covid is permanent.
Last I remember, Polio is still a threat. It is still out in the wild. It is not the geniuses who refuse to get the vaccine that will be the problem. It will be these drug manufacturers who will perpetuate a non-problem. Smallpox was eradicated, gone, done, because the entire world rose up against it. That will not happen with COVID. Too much money to be made. The world has changed. For the better for the drug makers.
Actually the pharma companies are working on a "permanent" COVID vaccine. It was always known that the current vaccines are only going to be effective for a year or two... and a booster would be needed due both new variants and antibodies waning. The original hope was that your next shot in 2022 would be a "permanent" vaccination -- this isn't going to happen. The progress on a "permanent" COVID vaccine that would last a lifetime has been slower than expected. This puts us in a situation where the expectation is there will be a need for boosters next year (and possibly in later years). At some point a "permanent" vaccine would be available. The real issue is getting a large majority of society vaccinated. If we fail to do this then this COVID pandemic will become a yearly endemic (like the flu). There would need to be year boosters to stay ahead of new variants as the disease is still active & spawning variants. Even if the disease level is cut due to many people having shots & immunity - scenarios where society is impacted each year by a season of COVID disease is not very appealing & would stop society from being "normal" if the spread in a community was too high. Remember they close down schools and workplaces today for measles (and other diseases) in communities with outbreaks & low vaccination levels.
Makes one wonder why there was never "vaccine hesitation" when it came to Smallpox and the MMR shot (which includes measles).
No Fox News No Tucker Carlson No Breitbart No idiots with millions of social media followers Most everyone was on the same page--the correct page.
There was vaccine hesitation in the past (mainly in some religious communities) but not at the level today that is caused by the anti-vaxxer movement coupled with social media. In the past there were instances of "no vaccine, no job" and campaigns that framed being vaccinated as being patriotic. Our current problems with vaccine hesitation in the U.S. and elsewhere have fueled the outbreaks of measles and other diseases -- which were effectively unheard of (post vaccine introduction) in western countries until recent years.
your anti vaxxer shit is ignorant 1. People waiting for data on new technology are not necessarily anti vaxxers. They are waiting for data which normally would have been more thoroughly developed for vaccines which went through the normal non rushed vetting process. At first, the healthier and younger you are, the more prudent its seemed to be to wait for the data. Now with so many millions of doses being distributed I think we can start to conclude the short term risk of the mRNA vaccines is very low. But some countries are discontinuing the use of 2 of the vaccines. For those that were low risk... it was clearly prudent to wait for a month or two to see it shake out.