Global Health Experts Warn Against Herd Immunity Approach to Covid-19
In an open letter, 80 health experts call the approach ‘a dangerous fallacy unsupported by the scientific evidence’
Herd immunity has received significant attention since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic. Several countries hoped that herd immunity would offer protection against the virus, and some even went so far as to loosen restrictions to allow for the natural spread of the virus. In an open letter published today in The Lancet, dozens of health officials publicly criticized herd immunity approaches to slowing Covid-19 as flawed and dangerous.
Herd immunity relies on an adequate number of immune individuals within a population such that a pathogen is unable to spread. Beyond that, herd immunity differs widely from one disease to another. Vaccines offer a powerful example of how herd immunity can control the spread of a disease. For example, a measles vaccination rate above 95% is sufficient to halt the spread of the measles virus.
However, reliance on herd immunity for a disease such as measles is underscored by years of scientific data that supports the efficacy of the vaccine, and the durability of immunity conferred. Just seven months into the Covid-19 pandemic, this level of scientific…
