Funny, I didn't pay. Here's the raw text:
We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April
Covid cases have dropped 77% in six weeks. Experts should level with the
public about the good news.
By Marty Makary
Feb. 18, 2021 12:35 pm ET
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ILLUSTRATION: MARTIN KOZLOWSKI
Amid the dire Covid warnings, one crucial fact has been largely ignored:
Cases are down 77% over the past six weeks. If a medication slashed cases
by 77%, we’d call it a miracle pill. Why is the number of cases plummeting
much faster than experts predicted?
In large part because natural immunity from prior infection is far more
common than can be measured by testing. Testing has been capturing only
from 10% to 25% of infections, depending on when during the pandemic
someone got the virus. Applying a time-weighted case capture average of 1
in 6.5 to the cumulative 28 million confirmed cases would mean about 55% of
Americans have natural immunity.
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Now add people getting vaccinated. As of this week, 15% of Americans have
received the vaccine, and the figure is rising fast. Former Food and Drug
Commissioner Scott Gottlieb estimates 250 million doses will have been
delivered to some 150 million people by the end of March.
There is reason to think the country is racing toward an extremely low
level of infection. As more people have been infected, most of whom have
mild or no symptoms, there are fewer Americans left to be infected. At the
current trajectory, I expect Covid will be mostly gone by April, allowing
Americans to resume normal life.
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Antibody studies almost certainly underestimate natural immunity. Antibody
testing doesn’t capture antigen-specific T-cells, which develop “memory”
once they are activated by the virus. Survivors of the 1918 Spanish flu
were found in 2008—90 years later—to have memory cells still able to
produce neutralizing antibodies.
Researchers at Sweden’s Karolinska Institute found that the percentage of
people mounting a T-cell response after mild or asymptomatic Covid-19
infection consistently exceeded the percentage with detectable antibodies.
T-cell immunity was even present in people who were exposed to infected
family members but never developed symptoms. A group of U.K. scientists in
September pointed out that the medical community may be under-appreciating
the prevalence of immunity from activated T-cells.
Covid-19 deaths in the U.S. would also suggest much broader immunity than
recognized. About 1 in 600 Americans has died of Covid-19, which translates
to a population fatality rate of about 0.15%. The Covid-19 infection
fatality rate is about 0.23%. These numbers indicate that roughly
two-thirds of the U.S. population has had the infection.
In my own conversations with medical experts, I have noticed that they too
often dismiss natural immunity, arguing that we don’t have data. The data
certainly doesn’t fit the classic randomized-controlled-trial model of the
old-guard medical establishment. There’s no control group. But the
observational data is compelling.
I have argued for months that we could save more American lives if those
with prior Covid-19 infection forgo vaccines until all vulnerable seniors
get their first dose. Several studies demonstrate that natural immunity
should protect those who had Covid-19 until more vaccines are available.
Half my friends in the medical community told me: Good idea. The other half
said there isn’t enough data on natural immunity, despite the fact that
reinfections have occurred in less than 1% of people—and when they do
occur, the cases are mild.
But the consistent and rapid decline in daily cases since Jan. 8 can be
explained only by natural immunity. Behavior didn’t suddenly improve over
the holidays; Americans traveled more over Christmas than they had since
March. Vaccines also don’t explain the steep decline in January.
Vaccination rates were low and they take weeks to kick in.
My prediction that Covid-19 will be mostly gone by April is based on
laboratory data, mathematical data, published literature and conversations
with experts. But it’s also based on direct observation of how hard testing
has been to get, especially for the poor. If you live in a wealthy
community where worried people are vigilant about getting tested, you might
think that most infections are captured by testing. But if you have seen
the many barriers to testing for low-income Americans, you might think that
very few infections have been captured at testing centers. Keep in mind
that most infections are asymptomatic, which still triggers natural
immunity.
Many experts, along with politicians and journalists, are afraid to talk
about herd immunity. The term has poli
