I found this article interesting - it discusses how we might reach a level of "normalcy" with the pandemic - when and how might it "end".
McKinsey’s evolving perspectives on when will the COVID-19 pandemic end in the United States updated to examine how timing will vary around the world.
www.mckinsey.com
They are now suggesting that herd immunity may not be where we land, and that we may shift to treating Covid as an endemic disease. The clear call out here is that there aren't any more dangerous variants like "delta", and that we are willing to effectively allow the unvaccinated population to let covid run its course - since this population is getting small enough that hospital overruns are less frequent. Not surprising as this has been discussed for a while, but a little depressing for healthcare workers in areas of low vaccination adoption. Hopefully vaccine incentives will enough of a "life raft" to encourage more adoption....but I expect many will continue to fight against vaccines no matter what we do. The Delta variant certainly scared more people into getting vaccinated, but hopefully "Delta" wanes - and doesn't explode in school populations (for example).
It is interesting how so many of the anti vax arguments have been
around and unchanged for 135 years. There is clearly no way to thwart the movement, but as others have said, one can only keep providing the evidence (data) that vaccines (or disease inhibitors) work, and work well. That there is no fixed stance on a pandemic, and that as conditions evolve, so too will our response to those conditions (the perfect example being the learning that vaccinated people can carry the disease as effectively as unvaccinated - thus the need to continue containment measures to reduce the spread - so fewer unvaccinated people are hospitalized or killed). Much like the Titanic.....some will remain on deck steadfastly standing by their conviction that the ship simply cannot sink.
@swatski not sure if the doctor you quoted is the same one that appears to have been misquoted elsewhere, but clearly (and thankfully) the burden of Ivermectin overdose cases isn't
swamping any OK ERs. So hopefully stupidity isn't adding to the death toll of this pandemic (too much) - there was a
245% jump in reported exposure cases from July to August — from 133 to 459 (and this is simply a count of cases....so 459 in the grand scheme of things is pretty tiny).
@Bizywk Israel is indeed providing great information on breakthrough cases, and is the driving force behind study data that additional boosters are needed. This is because their population was one of the first large scale vaccinated populations - so we get to learn from them! (unlike one of the absurd assertions of the article you linked to - it has NOTHING to do with any relationship with big pharma! A ludicrous conspiracy theory)
