Researchers explain why reaching herd immunity to eradicate COVID-19 is unlikely
Experts are now saying people shouldn't expect to eradicate COVID-19 or even get to herd immunity. They say it's going to be around for a long time to come, but that doesn't mean people can't get back to a more normal life.
Researchers said especially now with variants like delta, people would need such a high level of immunity to get to herd immunity that people need to reset their expectations about what is feasible.
"I think the key here is to reset our expectations of what we think the future of this disease is going to be," said Dr. David Dowdy, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Dowdy said he doesn't expect COVID-19 to be completely eradicated or get to the point of herd immunity.
"The amount of vaccination or natural immunity we would need to get to that level is really high and probably too high for us to attain given our current society," said Dowdy.
Dowdy said it's unlikely even to get down to the low-level of a disease like measles, at 92% vaccination, for several reasons.
Other countries would also have to attain an extremely high level of immunity. The vaccines work well to keep people from getting seriously ill, but people can still get infected and transmit the disease and kids under 12 still aren't eligible for vaccination.
"And then since we have communities of people who have very low immunity because they haven't been vaccinated, there's always going to be that ongoing risk for small outbreaks," said Dowdy.
"I think we are going to continue to see some level of disease burden most of the time that doesn't mean it has to be devastating," said Dr. Mark Goldstein, of emergency department of Maryland's Carroll Hospital.
Goldstein has been treating COVID-19 patients in Carroll hospital's emergency room and he doesn't expect that to stop anytime soon. But there is hope this latest wave is easing.
"The test positivity rate has flattened out over the last week or so, hospitalizations have also flattened although in hospitals like ours there's still a significant portion of our patients are coming in with COVID," Goldstein said.
Dowdy said the goal should be through vaccination to get COVID-19 down to a level where the risk of serious disease is low.
"I think we can get it to something we can tolerate and that we can live our life close enough to the way it was before that we feel like it's very much a life worth living," he said.
Goldstein said the vast majority of COVID-19 patients seriously ill at his hospital are unvaccinated, those who are vaccinated tend to have much milder symptoms.
