{"id":29592,"date":"2020-12-28T12:37:00","date_gmt":"2020-12-28T17:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/philip.greenspun.com\/blog\/?p=29592"},"modified":"2020-12-22T14:44:11","modified_gmt":"2020-12-22T19:44:11","slug":"the-science-of-herd-immunity-evolves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/philip.greenspun.com\/blog\/2020\/12\/28\/the-science-of-herd-immunity-evolves\/","title":{"rendered":"The science of herd immunity evolves"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>From <a href=\"https:\/\/www.who.int\/news-room\/q-a-detail\/coronavirus-disease-covid-19-serology\">the World Health Organization, right now<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>\u2018Herd immunity\u2019, also known as \u2018population immunity\u2019, is a concept used for vaccination, in which a population can be protected from a certain virus if a threshold of vaccination is reached.<\/p><p>Herd immunity is achieved by protecting people from a virus, not by exposing them to it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Same URL, <a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20201101161006\/https:\/\/www.who.int\/news-room\/q-a-detail\/coronavirus-disease-covid-19-serology\">but the archive.org version captured in November<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Herd immunity is the indirect protection from an infectious disease that happens when a population is immune either through vaccination or immunity developed through previous infection. This means that even people who haven\u2019t been infected, or in whom an infection hasn\u2019t triggered an immune response, they are protected because people around them who are immune can act as buffers between them and an infected person. The threshold for establishing herd immunity for COVID-19 is not yet clear.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>It is tough to think of a time when science has progressed so quickly!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Also, in the Department of Evolution of Science, <a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20200604003932\/https:\/\/www.who.int\/emergencies\/diseases\/novel-coronavirus-2019\/advice-for-public\/when-and-how-to-use-masks\">the W.H.O.&#8217;s January-June 2020 recommendation against masks for the general public<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/philip.greenspun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/image-24.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/philip.greenspun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/image-24.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-29593\" width=\"373\" height=\"356\" srcset=\"https:\/\/philip.greenspun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/image-24.png 706w, https:\/\/philip.greenspun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/image-24-300x287.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 373px) 100vw, 373px\" \/><\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Related:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/2020\/us\/south-dakota-coronavirus-cases.html\">NYT curve of South Dakota COVID-19 cases<\/a>, going up and then down despite no mask or shutdown order being issued (herd immunity without a vaccine or something else?)<\/li><\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>From the World Health Organization, right now: \u2018Herd immunity\u2019, also known as \u2018population immunity\u2019, is a concept used for vaccination, in which a population can be protected from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-coronapanic"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - 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