Do you agree with Swedens Herd Immunity Approach?

[BurningPlayd0h]

@klrman

Just curious who agrees or disagrees with Swedens virus approach. Of 30 people I personally know in my area, 25 people agree with Sweden’s approach and believe it’s best to suffer short term for longer term results. The five people who didn’t agree were very aggressive in their beliefs. First vote was from me in favour of herd immunity but I would bet that this poll will sway heavily against it. Going to be interesting how it turns out.

That seems like the exact opposite of this approach. Not taking the small hit of isolation/social distancing now will result in a worse outbreak down the road.

Let’s say 80+% of the population becomes infected (a very possible outcome due to the high R-rating of the virus, maybe even too conservative), with a 1% mortality rate (< an optimistic projection) that’s 80,000 deaths.

Herd immunity is not a solution to a pandemic - it is the entire population rolling the dice where the outcomes are 1) Don’t get sick and become immune, 2) Get extremely sick (possibly with lasting impact on your body), 3) Die.

Whatever the government says, anyone with risk factors should STAY HOME and ISOLATE. You are putting your life at risk for no reason by gathering and not taking precautions. This virus can be contained with proper measures taken early enough, and doing so later still limits the impact.

Having a massive outbreak all at once will overwhelm hospitals just like it has in the hotspots in Europe and the US and the death count will skyrocket. There are pictures of what measures are being taken to manage the cadavers and they should be a wake up call to anyone thinking we should “sweat this out”.

[CNCman]

Did Sweden have a lottery to pic those who will be vaccinated, use age groups, male/female, rich/poor, or race. And what percent will be vaccinated and with what vaccine ???
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Not enough info to make a vote.
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This is speculation and or BS.
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[Joshk]

Um, we don’t know yet if immunity works on Covid-19. Emerging evidence seems to suggest it may be like herpes or cold-sores. It may stay in you and comes back when it feels like it.

[BurningPlayd0h]

@CNCman

Did Sweden have a lottery to pic those who will be vaccinated, use age groups, male/female, rich/poor, or race. And what percent will be vaccinated and with what vaccine ???
.
Not enough info to make a vote.
.
This is speculation and or BS.
.

No, he’s saying their strategy is to let the majority of the population infected so that there is her immunity due to natural immunity after infection.

@Joshk

Um, we don’t know yet if immunity works on Covid-19. Emerging evidence seems to suggest it may be like herpes or cold-sores. It may stay in you and comes back when it feels like it.

Possible… and frightening. But we won’t have any idea how likely that is until test kits that aren’t very inaccurate are widely available and there can be in-depth monitoring of recovered patients. At this point it’s equally likely that the virus is simply long-lived in those with weaker immune systems and that tests are inaccurate.

[phouton]

I think it’s worth pointing out that Swedish officials deny using the “herd immunity” approach, while it is critics of Sweden’s approach that label it as such. Sweden prepares for possible tighter coronavirus measures as deaths rise | Sweden | The Guardian

Anders Tegnell, Sweden’s chief epidemiologist, has described the country’s coronavirus strategy as an attempt to ensure “a slow spread of infection and that the health services are not overwhelmed”, arguing that it is important for a part of the population to acquire immunity.

Tegnell has denied trying to build rapid “herd immunity” to the virus, a strategy originally adopted by the UK and the Netherlands before projected soaring death numbers prompted those countries to change course, but he has conceded that such a policy is “not contradictory” to Sweden’s objectives.

As for whether Sweden’s approach is actually herd immunity or not… that is harder to say. Herd immunity seems like a bad strategy (or really no strategy, unless you count social darwinism) at the start of a contagious disease. Imagine advocating that strategy with smallpox or measles. Herd immunity with vaccination is a different story. So because of all that, I did not vote in the poll.

Maybe the intent of the question is whether you agree with the lockdown policy. Even there, I would have a hard time answering: in the short term, I support lockdowns to tackle the exponential growth in spread and to avoid overwhelming health care systems. In the longer run, I have a hard time seeing how lockdowns can be maintained, due to the social, logistical, and economic consequences. Plus, it’s really not a solution to the virus. I think measures for keeping the spread rate low will be key, such as maintaining social distancing protocols and reminding people to wash hands, etc.

I think there’s room for thinking and rethinking policies, and I suspect they will be adapted over time. The danger in my view is in denying the problem due to not liking the consequences of a policy.

Solutions I can imagine so far are 1) eventual herd immunity through a vaccine, which will realistically take significant time to develop and deploy, 2) eradicating the virus without a cure by isolating cases until there is no active cases left and no more transmission (possible? I dunno), 3) ???

I think this coronavirus will force people to take both the health and economic risks of pandemics more seriously, and hopefully form a more suitable strategy for the future, as some Asian countries did after their previous experiences. After all, we can anticipate that there will be a next time… and I don’t think we want to go through this again.

“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” comes to mind.

[sb56637]

I appreciate that the majority have tried to be reasonable and maintain their calm with this topic. Actually lots of interesting information to mull over. So I’m not chastising anybody, but I do think it would be wise to get out while the getting’s good, i.e. before a fight breaks out in this thread. I believe I can leave the poll open while closing comments on this thread. Here goes, be safe everyone!