A Wall Street Journal op-ed earlier proclaimed that there would be herd immunity by April this year. In a piece by The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine's Dr. Marty Makary, he opined that the United States is racing headed for extremely low COVID-19 infection rates.
In the said piece Makary wrote that as more people have contracted the virus, most of whom experience mild or no symptoms at all, fewer Americans have been left to be infected.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the White House Chief Medical Advisor and the foremost authority on pandemics of the country. traced out a far more traditional timeline. He forecasted that that not until the end of 2021 will the US reach a level of normalcy.
Essentially, since early January, reported The Oklahoman, when new COVID-19 cases in the US reached an all-time high of about 300,000, the new infections rate had declined rapidly.
Lowest Figures Since Before Halloween
While the figures still signify a remarkable disease burden, they are the lowest seen since before Halloween. Hospitalizations are declining at the same rates.
More so, death rates are also said to be declining although not quite as fast. Still, with the death rates usually training new COVID-19 case and hospitalization figures by a couple of weeks, continued drop-offs in the said figures are also then expected.
Statistics in Oklahoma are reportedly mirroring such nationwide trends and, as the piece specified, Oklahomans should welcome this as great news.
Furthermore, looking at such curves, it seems that the third major surge of infections that started in the fall may be ending.
In the said news report, it was specified, it's tough to know what drives the figures. It is even tougher to know if we are at the cusp of herd immunity, that time when so much of the populace has been infected or given the vaccine that the virus stops transmitting.
Furthermore, the US has registered just below 30 million confirmed COVID-19 cases. Pretty much everyone is agreeing this number undercounts the number of people who have been infected.
Vaccination Impact
Vaccination is impacting how fast such numbers are reached. Presently, only roughly 20 million Americans have been fully vaccinated.
However, if the country stays at the present clip of about 1.7 million people each day, it would mean 50 million new members more each month to the herd.
Some of the people getting the vaccine will unavoidably be 'reproductions' which means, they are already enjoying immunity because of infection.
Still, with the herd that grows at anything near 50 million a month, prevalent immunity needs to arrive by middle of summer, if not earlier.
According to the antibody testing done in Oklahoma and the number of verified contagions, Dr. Judith James approximates that over 30 percent of the population of the state is presently seropositive, taking antibodies, as a result of either vaccination or infection. Dr. Judith James is leading COVID-19 study initiatives at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation.
If the current vaccination rates and infection continues, the expert estimates they could reach 70-percent levels in Oklahoma by late July.
Early reports about herd immunity in Oklahoma have already come out, as the one shown on KOCO 5 News' YouTube video below.
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