Mediaboss Marketing

Tuesday, 4 May 2021, 10:24 amArticle: Eric Zuesse

On May 3rd, the New York Times bannered Reaching HerdImmunity Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts NowBelieve and reported that there is widespreadconsensus among scientists and public health experts thatthe herd immunity threshold is not attainable at leastnot in the foreseeable future, and perhaps notever.

In other words: the news-sources thatwere opposing the governments taking action againstCovid-19 libertarian news-sites that opposegovernmental laws and regulations, regardless of thepredominant view by the vast majority of the scientists whospecialize in studying the given subject are lookingwronger all the time, as this novel coronavirus (whichis what it was originally called) becomes less and lessnovel, and more and more understoodscientifically.

The herd immunity advocates foranti-Covid-19 policies have been saying that governmentsshould just let the virus spread until nature takes itscourse and such a large proportion of the population havesurvived the infection as to then greatly reduce thelikelihood that an uninfected person will become infected.An uninfected person will increasingly be surrounded bypeople who have developed a natural immunity to the disease,and by people who dont and never did become infected byit. The vulnerable people will have become eliminated (died)or else cured, and so they wont be spreading the diseaseto others. Thats the libertarian solution, thefinal solution to the Covid-19 problem, according tolibertarians.

For example, on 9 April 2020,Forbes magazine headlined AfterRejecting A Coronavirus Lockdown, Sweden Sees Rise InDeaths and reported that, Swedens chiefepidemiologist Anders Tegnell has continuously advocated forlaid back measures, saying on Swedish TV Sunday that thepandemic could be defeated by herd immunity, or the indirectprotection from a large portion of a population being immuneto an infection, or a combination of immunityand vaccination. However, critics have argued that withacoronavirus vaccine could be more than a year away, andinsufficient evidence that coronavirus patients that recoverare immune from becominginfected again, the strategy of relying on herd immunityand vaccinations [is] ineffective.

The libertarianproposal of relying upon herd immunity for producingpolicies against this disease has continued,nonetheless.

CNN headlined on 28 April 2020, Swedensays its coronavirus approach has worked. The numberssuggest a different story, and reportedthat

On March 28, a petition signed by 2,000Swedish researchers, including Carl-Henrik Heldin, chairmanof the Nobel Foundation, called for the nation's governmentto "immediately take steps to comply with the World HealthOrganization's (WHO) recommendations."

Thescientists added: "The measures should aim to severely limitcontact between people in society and to greatly increasethe capacity to test people for Covid-19infection."

"These measures must be in place assoon as possible, as is currently the case in our Europeanneighboring countries," they wrote. "Our country should notbe an exception to the work to curb thepandemic."

The petition said that trying to"create a herd immunity, in the same way that occurs duringan influenza epidemic, has low scientificsupport."

Swedish authorities have deniedhaving a strategy to create herd immunity, one the UKgovernment was rumored to be working towards earlier on inthe pandemic -- leading to widespread criticism -- before itenforced a strict lockdown.

FORTUNEmagazine headlined on 30 July 2020, Howparts of India inadvertently achieved herd immunity,and reported that, Around 57% of people across parts ofIndia's financial hub of Mumbai have coronavirus antibodies,a July study found, indicating that the population may haveinadvertently achieved the controversial herd immunityprotection from the coronavirus.Furthermore:

Herd immunity is an approach to thecoronavirus pandemic where, instead of instituting lockdownsand other restrictions to slow infections, authorities allowdaily life to go on as normal, letting the disease spread.In theory, enough people will become infected, recover, andgain immunity that the spread will slow on its own andpeople who are not immune will be protected by the immunityof those who are. University of Chicago researchersestimated in a paperpublished in May that achieving herd immunity from COVID-19would require 67% of people to be immune to the disease.Mayo Clinic estimates70% of the U.S. population will need to be immune for theU.S. to achieve herd immunity, which can also be achieved byvaccinating that proportion of a population.

On 27September 2020, Reuters bannered InBrazil's Amazon a COVID-19 resurgence dashes herd immunityhopes, and reported that, The largest city inBrazils Amazon has closed bars and river beaches tocontain a fresh surge of coronavirus cases, a trend that maydash theories that Manaus was one of the worlds firstplaces to reach collective, or herd, immunity.

Rightnow, the global average of Covid-19 intensity (total cases of the diseasethus far) is 19,693 persons per million population. Forexamples: Botswana is barely below that intensity, at19,629, and Norway is barely above that intensity, at20,795. Sweden is at 95,905, which is nearly five times theglobal average. Brazil is 69,006, which is around 3.5 timesworse than average. India is 14,321, which is slightlybetter than average. USA is 99,754.

However, the dayprior, on May 2nd, America had 30,701 new cases. Brazil had28,935. Norway had 210. India had 370,059. Swedens latestdaily count (as-of May 3rd) was 5,937 on April 29th, 15times Norways 385 on that date. Swedens population is1.9 times that of Norway. Indias daily count is soaring.Their population is four times Americas, but the numberof new daily cases in India is twelve times Americas.Whereas India has had only one-seventh as much Covid-19intensity till now, India is soaring upwards to becomeultimately, perhaps, even worse than America is on Covid-19performance. And Brazil is already almost as bad as America,on Covid-19 performance, and will soon surpass America inCovid-19 failure.

There is no herd immunityagainst Covid-19, yet, anywhere. Its just anotherlibertarian myth. But libertariansstill continue to believe it they refuse to accept thedata.

Investigativehistorian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of TheyreNot Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican EconomicRecords, 1910-2010, and of CHRISTSVENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that CreatedChristianity.

Scoop Media

Become a member Find out more

Read more:
The 'Post-Covid-19 World' Will Never Come. - Scoop.co.nz