Skip to main content

Herd Immunity: Are we There Yet?

Happy Independence Day, and happy herd immunity. Yes, I know our betters keep harping on us to get a COVID shot, keep haranguing us about variants, and keep the hysteria going. They loved knowing better than the rest of us and telling everyone what to do. But going by all-cause mortality rates and actual science, their fifteen minutes of fame needs to fizzle out. Yes, a virulent new variant could emerge later, but it looks like it's time to enjoy some normalcy and have the coronabros go back into obscurity. 

Hoping you're healthy as a horse! Picture from Pixabay.


All-cause mortality rates are now at or below the 2015-2019 average for all age groups in the US. They've been close to that average for months in both the US and UK, even though the delta variant accounts for almost all cases in the UK. Click to enlarge images.


Weekly number of deaths by age in the US. Source: CDC.

The first chart shows deaths from all causes plunging from January 2021 on in the US. (It also shows there was no "surge upon surge" following Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings, but an upward trend that started around October.) In some states, deaths started falling off a cliff in December.  The UK followed in February and enjoyed below-average deaths over the spring. 

How can that be? Hardly anybody was vaccinated in January! People went to holiday dinners even though Google and a gaggle of governors told them not to go! Dr. Marty Makary, a professor at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, reminded the natural immunity deniers back in February that the human immune system includes T-cells that can produce antibodies decades after exposure to a virus. 

"...the consistent and rapid decline in daily cases since Jan. 8 can be explained only by natural immunity. Behavior didn’t suddenly improve over the holidays; Americans traveled more over Christmas than they had since March. Vaccines also don’t explain the steep decline in January. Vaccination rates were low and they take weeks to kick in.

He cited a study showing that reinfections occur in only 1% of people, and that those infections were mild. He also calculated that far more people had been infected with COVID than antigen tests suggested--two-thirds of the US population by his estimate. A recent NIH study gives some support for this: "researchers estimate nearly 17 million undiagnosed cases by July 2020." The previous estimate was only three million. The Mayo Clinic says, 

Experts estimate that in the U.S., 70% of the population — more than 200 million people — would have to recover from COVID-19 to halt the pandemic...Herd immunity also can be reached when enough people have been vaccinated against a disease and have developed protective antibodies against future infection. 

Dr. Makary predicted herd immunity by April in the US and he may have called it. 

But the variants! I know India and a few other countries struggled with variants--partly because they ran out of supplies for the patients. But this chart from the Spectator UK doesn't indicate such a scenario in Scotland, at least:



Another chart shows daily COVID deaths for the entire UK in low double digits, down 98.8% below peak. 


So the busybodies, the finger waggers and the fearmongers can all piss off. If COVID comes roaring back, I can think about getting the vaccine--but if the vaccines don't work against some new variant, there won't have been much use in taking it. 


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

This Just In: Yogurt Doesn't Improve Health

A recent study from Spain finds "In comparison with people that did not eat yogurt, those who ate this dairy product regularly did not display any significant improvement in their score on the physical component of quality of life, and although there was a slight improvement mentally, this was not statistically significant," states López-García. Most yogurt is pretty much pudding with a little bacteria . Pudding is a sugar bomb. Hard to believe the stuff doesn't improve health outcomes, isn't it? But as usual, researchers are calling for...more research. "For future research more specific instruments must be used which may increase the probability of finding a potential benefit of this food."
23 comments
Read more

Paleo Diet: Eating Differently from Everyone Else is Fine!

I've been seeing more and more articles by women (it's always women) whose heads have exploded trying to figure out life without yogurt and cupcakes. Oh, the shenanigans they get up to: bathroom problems from stuffing themselves with vegetables, paleo baked goods that don't taste the same as ones from the bakery, and especially the irresistible urge to eat "normally." The technical problems aren't hard to sort out: substitutes like baked goods will taste different because they are different, but an adjustment period of a few months will make those foods taste normal. And whatever you eat, don't stuff yourself. First, though, read a book by Loren Cordain or Mark Sisson to learn about the paleo diet before diving in. The articles I keep reading, though, have more to do with attitude: the urge to be exactly like everybody else or the urge to be helpless. If you're in the second category, I can't, by definition, help you. If you'd rather be Lu
19 comments
Read more

Robert F. Kennedy shows up at the FDA

 
Post a Comment
Read more

Decongestant Ineffective; Vibration Plate Works

A common ingredient in many cold medicines has been shown so ineffective that the FDA recently proposed taking it off the market. The ingredient, phenylephrine, "failed to outperform placebo pills in patients with cold and allergy congestion," say researchers from the University of Florida. "The same researchers also challenged the drug's effectiveness in 2007, but the FDA allowed the products to remain on the market pending additional research," according to CNBC .  Mostly placebos. Photo from Pixabay . I can attest that phenylephrine doesn't work. Before I stopped eating wheat, I constantly had nasal and sinus congestion. I helped keep Sudafed in business when the active ingredient was pseudoephedrine, but I noticed the PE (phenylephrine) variety didn't work at all. The only other decongestants I've found helpful are guaifenesin (Mucinex) and spicy food. Mucinex is expensive because it works! (The cheaper store brands work just as well, though.) Su
Post a Comment
Read more

Palpitations Gone with Iron

Thanks to my internet friend Larcana, who alerted me to the connection between iron deficiency and palpitations, I doubled down on my iron supplements and, for good measure, washed them down with Emergen-C. It's a cold medicine with a mega-dose of vitamin C, plus B vitamins and minerals. I don't think vitamin C does anything for a cold (a friend bought the stuff and left it at my house the last time she visited), but vitamin C does help iron absorption. After doubling up on iron in the last three days, I feel back to normal. (I'd already been taking quite a bit of magnesium and potassium, so I probably had sufficient levels of those.) How did I get so low on iron? Maybe it was too many Quest bars instead of red meat when I had odd cravings during my dental infection recently. Maybe because it's too hard to find liver at the grocery store and I haven't eaten much of it lately. Maybe the antibiotics damaged my intestines . And apparently, I'm a heavy bleeder .
18 comments
Read more