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I'm glad people are realizing that all this social distancing is merely a pause button on the virus. Once we press play on society, exponential growth will happ

I'm glad people are realizing that all this social distancing is merely a pause button on the virus. Once we press play on society, exponential growth will happen again and we will have effectively rolled back the clock until we reach herd immunity through things like the OP's suggestion. At least this next time we'll hopefully have more PPE.

danieltillett 6y ago
Exactly. There is also everyone in poor countries that is beyond the reach of expensive vaccines.
- robocat 6y ago
  A country without other options might be more interested in the idea? I imagine that many first world countries would be too worried about the potential liabilities.
  - danieltillett 6y ago
    I suspect even the first world will be interested in options like this after a few more months of social isolation.
    - robocat 6y ago
      On second thoughts perhaps the idea wouldn’t work in countries that don’t have an effective lockdown. Could the infection wave of a less dangerous genotype overtake the number of infections of the more dangerous genotype before the population has been mostly infected already?
      - danieltillett 6y ago
        Yes if we act soon as we can spread the less dangerous version faster than the normal human-to-human spread of the dangerous version. For example if we were to send a postcard infected with the less dangerous version to 10 million people it would get out ahead of the dangerous version spreading normally.
  - eirini1 6y ago
    good luck, we could have completely eliminated HIV by now but corporate profits are more important than that so the vast majority of the population who has the virus doesn't get the medication they need to not transmit it.
Taek 6y ago
I'd much rather live in a world where everyone is required to wear masks all the time than live in a world where we are all told to stay home all the time. I believe it's also well established that any measures taken to slow the spread of a new virus will always result in fewer total deaths, in that sense quarantining is much more effective than just being a pause button.
- hutzlibu 6y ago
  "where everyone is required to wear masks all the time" And this is what bothers me with such laws. No it does not make sense to wear masks all the time. (even assumed only outside) When I am running alone in the forest I do not need a mask. While driving a car alone, or with a partner, I do not need a mask. So the law should be, wearing masks all the time in populated public spaces. "I believe it's also well established that any measures taken to slow the spread of a new virus will always result in fewer total deaths" And this is only true if you look only isolated at the virus and do not take into account the various big side effects of a lockdown. Because you will get deaths from: suicide, domestic violence, other diseases, because staying home is not really good for the immune system and general health. Also this only takes into account the rich world. In india staying home is also required, but this is a really serious death risk, if your home is a metal barrack in the slums, with no AC, meaning you just get cooked. Before you starve to death, because you have no income anymore.
- foobarbecue 6y ago
  "fewer total deaths" Yes, but not fewer total infections. You save lives by spreading out the infections over time, reducing strain on the healthcare system.
- grey-area 6y ago
  This is a false dichotomy. Masks or gloves as worn by ordinary people are nowhere near effective enough to mean lockdowns could end. They're very effective in clinical settings with proper ppe head to toe and procedures for taking them off outside the dirty ward, but there's no way most people can stick to those, nor keep their houses/shops clean enough. I believe it's also well established that any measures taken to slow the spread of a new virus will always result in fewer total deaths In the sense that they prevent a healthcare system being overwhelmed yes, in any other sense no, they are very much just a pause button for the spread of the virus, not a cure.
coconut_crab 6y ago
(I am not a professional, so what I write below might be wrong) Having more time to develop a vaccine or effective treatments is essential, it doesn't have to be herd immunity. Plus in countries where covid19 rate is low enough, social distancing can be helpful for finding and isolating clusters to suppress the epidemic.
- Guthur 6y ago
  Of course, there are two ways out of this, herd or vaccine. The above is a variation of herd that may result in less deaths. The real problem is that waiting until a vaccine is just not even remotely realistic for so many reasons that it's not even funny. We could end up causing more indirect deaths with social isolation than we could possibly imagine, worst case being a huge collapse in the economy results in a large regional or global conflict.
  - foobarbecue 6y ago
    Herd immunity generally depends on having a vaccine. https://www.vaccines.gov/basics/work/protection https://www.vaccines.gov/basics/work/protection Are there any examples of humanity developing herd immunity without a vaccine?
    - op00to 6y ago
      Black Death?
      - foobarbecue 6y ago
        I don't think so. https://www.theweek.co.uk/76088/what-was-black-death-and-how-did-it-end https://www.theweek.co.uk/76088/what-was-black-death-and-how... says: "How did it end? The most popular theory of how the plague ended is through the implementation of quarantines. The uninfected would typically remain in their homes and only leave when it was necessary, while those who could afford to do so would leave the more densely populated areas and live in greater isolation. Improvements in personal hygiene are also thought to have begun to take place during the pandemic, alongside the practice of cremations rather than burials due to the sheer number of bodies."
tilolebo 6y ago
It's not a pause button, it's a playback speed button that slows down the contamination. Remember #FlattenTheCurve. What is true is that it would take waaaay longer to reach herd immunity this way. Another thing that people usually get wrong is the her immunity concept: from what I understand, it doesn't mean we ALL need to be infected. We just need to be enough, so the virus can't spread anymore.
- roenxi 6y ago
  Alas, if you do some order of magnitude calculations you might find that that'll take a very long time.
  - novaRom 6y ago
    And if immunity lasts 6 to 24 months as this author suggests, there might well be no chance for a herd immunity.
- foobarbecue 6y ago
  Herd immunity doesn't happen until you have a vaccine.
  - yoz-y 6y ago
    Or until something like 95% of population has been infected and we know for sure that those who already had the disease can not spread it anymore.
    - foobarbecue 6y ago
      Has this ever happened in humans? I haven't been able to find an example.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
      - jimktrains2 6y ago
DagAgren 6y ago
The point of social distancing is to bring the number of cases down to a point where other measures are possible, such as test-and-trace. Social distancing is step 1, not the whole process.
ajross 6y ago
This isn't really correct, and the proof is that most of east asia is relaxing restrictions right now without experiencing another exponential outbreak. Testing, tracing and quarantine of infected people does work. It requires a bunch of infrastructure that we don't have yet (and in many places still aren't building, which is beyond frustrating). It also requires that the baseline level of the outbreak be small enough that you can catch most of the cases, which thus requires the continued lockdowns until we get back to that level. But it does work.

danieltillett 6y ago

Exactly. There is also everyone in poor countries that is beyond the reach of expensive vaccines.

robocat 6y ago
A country without other options might be more interested in the idea? I imagine that many first world countries would be too worried about the potential liabilities.
- danieltillett 6y ago
  I suspect even the first world will be interested in options like this after a few more months of social isolation.
  - robocat 6y ago
    On second thoughts perhaps the idea wouldn’t work in countries that don’t have an effective lockdown. Could the infection wave of a less dangerous genotype overtake the number of infections of the more dangerous genotype before the population has been mostly infected already?
    - danieltillett 6y ago
      Yes if we act soon as we can spread the less dangerous version faster than the normal human-to-human spread of the dangerous version. For example if we were to send a postcard infected with the less dangerous version to 10 million people it would get out ahead of the dangerous version spreading normally.
- eirini1 6y ago
  good luck, we could have completely eliminated HIV by now but corporate profits are more important than that so the vast majority of the population who has the virus doesn't get the medication they need to not transmit it.

Taek 6y ago

I'd much rather live in a world where everyone is required to wear masks all the time than live in a world where we are all told to stay home all the time. I believe it's also well established that any measures taken to slow the spread of a new virus will always result in fewer total deaths, in that sense quarantining is much more effective than just being a pause button.

hutzlibu 6y ago
"where everyone is required to wear masks all the time" And this is what bothers me with such laws. No it does not make sense to wear masks all the time. (even assumed only outside) When I am running alone in the forest I do not need a mask. While driving a car alone, or with a partner, I do not need a mask. So the law should be, wearing masks all the time in populated public spaces. "I believe it's also well established that any measures taken to slow the spread of a new virus will always result in fewer total deaths" And this is only true if you look only isolated at the virus and do not take into account the various big side effects of a lockdown. Because you will get deaths from: suicide, domestic violence, other diseases, because staying home is not really good for the immune system and general health. Also this only takes into account the rich world. In india staying home is also required, but this is a really serious death risk, if your home is a metal barrack in the slums, with no AC, meaning you just get cooked. Before you starve to death, because you have no income anymore.
foobarbecue 6y ago
"fewer total deaths" Yes, but not fewer total infections. You save lives by spreading out the infections over time, reducing strain on the healthcare system.
grey-area 6y ago
This is a false dichotomy. Masks or gloves as worn by ordinary people are nowhere near effective enough to mean lockdowns could end. They're very effective in clinical settings with proper ppe head to toe and procedures for taking them off outside the dirty ward, but there's no way most people can stick to those, nor keep their houses/shops clean enough. I believe it's also well established that any measures taken to slow the spread of a new virus will always result in fewer total deaths In the sense that they prevent a healthcare system being overwhelmed yes, in any other sense no, they are very much just a pause button for the spread of the virus, not a cure.

coconut_crab 6y ago

(I am not a professional, so what I write below might be wrong) Having more time to develop a vaccine or effective treatments is essential, it doesn't have to be herd immunity. Plus in countries where covid19 rate is low enough, social distancing can be helpful for finding and isolating clusters to suppress the epidemic.

Guthur 6y ago
Of course, there are two ways out of this, herd or vaccine. The above is a variation of herd that may result in less deaths. The real problem is that waiting until a vaccine is just not even remotely realistic for so many reasons that it's not even funny. We could end up causing more indirect deaths with social isolation than we could possibly imagine, worst case being a huge collapse in the economy results in a large regional or global conflict.
- foobarbecue 6y ago
  Herd immunity generally depends on having a vaccine. https://www.vaccines.gov/basics/work/protection https://www.vaccines.gov/basics/work/protection Are there any examples of humanity developing herd immunity without a vaccine?
  - op00to 6y ago
    Black Death?
    - foobarbecue 6y ago
      I don't think so. https://www.theweek.co.uk/76088/what-was-black-death-and-how-did-it-end https://www.theweek.co.uk/76088/what-was-black-death-and-how... says: "How did it end? The most popular theory of how the plague ended is through the implementation of quarantines. The uninfected would typically remain in their homes and only leave when it was necessary, while those who could afford to do so would leave the more densely populated areas and live in greater isolation. Improvements in personal hygiene are also thought to have begun to take place during the pandemic, alongside the practice of cremations rather than burials due to the sheer number of bodies."

tilolebo 6y ago

It's not a pause button, it's a playback speed button that slows down the contamination. Remember #FlattenTheCurve. What is true is that it would take waaaay longer to reach herd immunity this way. Another thing that people usually get wrong is the her immunity concept: from what I understand, it doesn't mean we ALL need to be infected. We just need to be enough, so the virus can't spread anymore.

roenxi 6y ago
Alas, if you do some order of magnitude calculations you might find that that'll take a very long time.
- novaRom 6y ago
  And if immunity lasts 6 to 24 months as this author suggests, there might well be no chance for a herd immunity.
foobarbecue 6y ago
Herd immunity doesn't happen until you have a vaccine.
- yoz-y 6y ago
  Or until something like 95% of population has been infected and we know for sure that those who already had the disease can not spread it anymore.
  - foobarbecue 6y ago
    Has this ever happened in humans? I haven't been able to find an example.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - jimktrains2 6y ago

DagAgren 6y ago

The point of social distancing is to bring the number of cases down to a point where other measures are possible, such as test-and-trace. Social distancing is step 1, not the whole process.

ajross 6y ago

This isn't really correct, and the proof is that most of east asia is relaxing restrictions right now without experiencing another exponential outbreak. Testing, tracing and quarantine of infected people does work. It requires a bunch of infrastructure that we don't have yet (and in many places still aren't building, which is beyond frustrating). It also requires that the baseline level of the outbreak be small enough that you can catch most of the cases, which thus requires the continued lockdowns until we get back to that level. But it does work.