I was originally pointed to it when complaining elsewhere that nobody was talking about, and media wasn’t pressing for, an honest analysis of “then what?” after the short flattening exercise proves the obvious, that it can be slowed. Without herd immunity (or as I like to call it, community immunity) either acquired or via vaccine, nothing will have meaningfully changed. So, then what?
The reality seemed obvious enough but The Hammer and the Dance was the first decent attempt I saw at answering that in any detail. Some comparisons, such as S Korea and Singapore are not great because they are better equipped for quick action to isolate and trace new outbreaks, but the general approach still needs to be similar.
I think there still needs to be more focus on insulating (sounds nicer than isolating) the most vulnerable, at least those who wish to be, as we gradually allow the lowest risk people to resume some semblance of normalcy with the full knowledge that a great many will become infected. Barring some miraculous mutation the ONLY way out of this is herd immunity and a vaccine is likely a year or more away IF it can be done at all. We can’t stay locked down indefinitely so we need to continue building immunity amongst those least likely to end up hospitalized while doing a better job of keeping them away from the most vulnerable. Easier said than done, but so are most things. What we can’t do is just wait this out and hope for a miracle.
I was originally pointed to it when complaining elsewhere that nobody was talking about, and media wasn’t pressing for, an honest analysis of “then what?” after the short flattening exercise proves the obvious, that it can be slowed. Without herd immunity (or as I like to call it, community immunity) either acquired or via vaccine, nothing will have meaningfully changed. So, then what?
The reality seemed obvious enough but The Hammer and the Dance was the first decent attempt I saw at answering that in any detail. Some comparisons, such as S Korea and Singapore are not great because they are better equipped for quick action to isolate and trace new outbreaks, but the general approach still needs to be similar.
I think there still needs to be more focus on insulating (sounds nicer than isolating) the most vulnerable, at least those who wish to be, as we gradually allow the lowest risk people to resume some semblance of normalcy with the full knowledge that a great many will become infected. Barring some miraculous mutation the ONLY way out of this is herd immunity and a vaccine is likely a year or more away IF it can be done at all. We can’t stay locked down indefinitely so we need to continue building immunity amongst those least likely to end up hospitalized while doing a better job of keeping them away from the most vulnerable. Easier said than done, but so are most things. What we can’t do is just wait this out and hope for a miracle.