Speaker 1: Before we get started, we have a favor to ask you.
Speaker 1: With a holiday season approaching, we want to hear what
Speaker 1: COVID dilemmas you're facing. Are you worried about air travel,
Speaker 1: having disagreements over whether relatives should come over for dinner?
Speaker 1: To have us run your questions by an expert, record
Speaker 1: a voicemail by calling six four six three two four
Speaker 1: three four zo We may use your voice on the show.
Speaker 1: And now for today's show, Welcome to Prognosis. I'm Laura Carlson.
Speaker 1: It's day two hundred and twenty three since coronavirus was
Speaker 1: declared a global pandemic. Today's main story. Herd immunity has
Speaker 1: become a buzzy phrase on the right. But the idea
Speaker 1: that allowing the coronavirus to infect more people will offer
Speaker 1: some type of protection from the virus to spread has
Speaker 1: been widely denounced by experts. But first, here's what happened
Speaker 1: in virus news today. Cafe Pacific will cut about fifty
Speaker 1: three hundred jobs and close its regional airline, Cafe Dragon unit.
Speaker 1: It's part of a sweeping restructuring that was triggered by
Speaker 1: the pandemics hit to air travel. In addition, to the layoffs,
Speaker 1: thousands of currently unfilled positions will be eliminated. The entire
Speaker 1: reduction amounts to around of cafe's head count. It's one
Speaker 1: of the largest cutbacks in the aviation sector globally since
Speaker 1: the outbreak started. Germany's new virus cases hit another record.
Speaker 1: The country recorded eight thousand, five hundred and twenty three
Speaker 1: new cases, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. That's
Speaker 1: the most the country has seen since the pandemic began.
Speaker 1: Like other countries in Europe, Germany has been grappling with
Speaker 1: rapidly rising cases in recent weeks. There were also forty
Speaker 1: new fatalities on Tuesday. Finally, an inspection of an Eli Lily,
Speaker 1: New Jersey facility where the company planned to produce its
Speaker 1: antibody therapy, found major quality control problems. In a memo
Speaker 1: from October two, compliance officers at the Food and Drug Administration,
Speaker 1: who conducted a four week site inspection over the summer,
Speaker 1: wrote that it is quote imperative that f D a
Speaker 1: take action. They recommended that the company received a warning letter,
Speaker 1: one of the agency's strongest enforcement measures. According to documents
Speaker 1: for You by Bloomberg News and Now for Today's main story.
Speaker 1: In the US, enthusiasm on the right is building for
Speaker 1: so called herd immunity as much of the public grows
Speaker 1: skeptical of coronavirus vaccines. These developments could dash hopes for
Speaker 1: containing COVID nineteen in the months ahead. Proponents of herd
Speaker 1: immunity say exposing more people to the coronavirus will build
Speaker 1: protection broadly in the population, but experts say that will
Speaker 1: result in many more illnesses and deaths, and that vaccines
Speaker 1: are a safer route to herd immunity. I spoke with
Speaker 1: Emma Court, who reports that the concept gained attraction in
Speaker 1: the White House due to the increasing influence of Trump
Speaker 1: medical advisor Scott Atlas. It would backed this month by
Speaker 1: a group of academics and a treatise titled the Great
Speaker 1: Barrington Declaration. Broadly speaking, when we talk about herd immunity,
Speaker 1: what do we mean. Herd immunity is this idea of
Speaker 1: having widespread enough protection in the population that the viruses
Speaker 1: chain of transmission gets cut off. Truly, we're talking about
Speaker 1: immunity that protects the herd. Right Usually, herd immunity comes
Speaker 1: up and is taught in epidemiology classes in the context
Speaker 1: of widespread vaccination, but it's emerged more recently as something
Speaker 1: that can be achieved through exposing more people to the coronavirus.
Speaker 1: Inherent in this idea of herd immunity, and the reason
Speaker 1: we've heard so much pushback from health experts is that
Speaker 1: by intentionally exposing more people to the coronavirus, we know
Speaker 1: there will be deaths, and people do suffer quite a
Speaker 1: lot from even mild forms of this disease, and it's
Speaker 1: not clear whether even if people survive the coronavirus, they,
Speaker 1: you know, will ever stop dealing with these longer term
Speaker 1: effects that we've been seeing among among patients. So have
Speaker 1: there been any real life examples of communities taking this
Speaker 1: herd immunity approach to COVID nineteen. People often point to
Speaker 1: Sweden as an example you can let the virus kind
Speaker 1: of run free, but even Sweden put restrictions on large gatherings,
Speaker 1: and there's been some reporting lately that the country may
Speaker 1: actually be changing its policies on on the coronavirus um.
Speaker 1: The United Kingdom as well was also accused of pursuing
Speaker 1: her community earlier on in the pandemics, something that officials
Speaker 1: they're denied Ultimately, health officials state we've never intentionally pursued
Speaker 1: her immunity as a strategy, um, and is too much
Speaker 1: on the line now to try it right today without
Speaker 1: a vaccine. What is the theory of achieving herd immunity
Speaker 1: to COVID nineteen, Yeah, you know, to some extent, this
Speaker 1: idea of herd immunity, you know, let the virus do
Speaker 1: what it wants, has been around in popular conversation since
Speaker 1: the start of this pandemic. Right. I think we've all
Speaker 1: heard some iteration of that from folks too, you know,
Speaker 1: think the virus isn't as serious that they should be
Speaker 1: allowed to move around the world freely. So, you know,
Speaker 1: like let people kind of do what they want and
Speaker 1: let the virus kind of spread as a will. It's
Speaker 1: it's been out there, um, but it's being packaged through
Speaker 1: this terminology of herd immunity. And most recently, um, you know,
Speaker 1: earlier this month at a gathering that was hosted by
Speaker 1: a free market think tank in Massachusetts, it was sort
Speaker 1: of put together as this Great Barrington Declaration. The leaders
Speaker 1: of this are are academics, you know, three academics at Harvard, Stanford,
Speaker 1: and Oxford, and they basically came together in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Instead,
Speaker 1: we can let the virus do what it will as
Speaker 1: long as healthy people are kind of out there moving
Speaker 1: around the world, and we can protect the vulnerable, you know,
Speaker 1: the elderly successfully until enough healthy people have been exposed
Speaker 1: and have this protective immunity, and hopefully, you know, that
Speaker 1: stops the virus from spreading. The timing of this, of course,
Speaker 1: is is all very interesting because theoretically we may have
Speaker 1: a vaccine in a matter of months um and it
Speaker 1: also is coming out here in the US and being
Speaker 1: sort of supported by politicians on the right at a
Speaker 1: time that the president himself just had COVID nineteen and
Speaker 1: there's an election rapidly approaching. So it's not clear to
Speaker 1: me what all of this signifies, but I think it
Speaker 1: is clear from how we've seen politicians at the state level,
Speaker 1: the local level talking about this Great Barrington declaration that
Speaker 1: no matter what the outcome of the presidential election is,
Speaker 1: this idea of herd immunity is going to live on.
Speaker 1: It's going to be used to justify policies at the
Speaker 1: stand local level, even if we have a change in
Speaker 1: the presidential administration. And what's been the response from a
Speaker 1: governmental perspective to this Great Barrington Declaration. This Great Barrington
Speaker 1: Declaration has been highlighted, you know, as prominently as the
Speaker 1: White House. There's a call last week by officials there
Speaker 1: who talked about how the Great Barrington Declaration was, you know,
Speaker 1: aligned with the President's own policies. And there's been a
Speaker 1: lot of talk about a senior medical advisor to the
Speaker 1: President named Scott Atlas, who is a neuro radiologist but
Speaker 1: doesn't have any formal epidemic theological training um and he's
Speaker 1: affiliated with Stanford's Conservative Hoover Institute. You know, this idea
Speaker 1: of herd immunity, which he's a proponent of, has become
Speaker 1: more discussed by the President. The White House has said,
Speaker 1: we are aligned with these principles of the Great Barrington Declaration,
Speaker 1: but we're not proponents of herd immunity. But ultimately, if
Speaker 1: you look at what herd immunity entails or what these
Speaker 1: Great Barrington proponents are talking about, it it's really not
Speaker 1: that dissimilar from what the United States is doing right now.
Speaker 1: So let's just get a little more specific in terms
Speaker 1: of what is in this Great Barrington Declaration, What exactly
Speaker 1: are they calling for in this document. This is kind
Speaker 1: of where the rubber meets the road. So if you
Speaker 1: look at this document, they aren't sayings, stop taking any
Speaker 1: precautionary measures at all. They actually say, you know, you
Speaker 1: should keep taking hygienic precautions like handwashing and staying home
Speaker 1: when you're sick. But we have seen this document be
Speaker 1: espoused by people who who are questioning masks and saying
Speaker 1: masks don't work, masks shouldn't be used. But if you
Speaker 1: look at the Great Barrington document, they actually kind of
Speaker 1: don't get into the details all that much. They say,
Speaker 1: and this is a quote, a comprehensive and detailed list
Speaker 1: of measures, including approaches to multi generational households, can be
Speaker 1: implemented and as well within the scope and capability of
Speaker 1: public health professionals. So they're like, herd immunity, we should
Speaker 1: be talking about it, but I'm not going to get
Speaker 1: too detailed on the policy. And that's important because we
Speaker 1: are many, many months into this pandemic. Who's going to
Speaker 1: come up with this policy on HERD immunity and how
Speaker 1: it's gonna work other than the people who are advocating
Speaker 1: for it, you know, public health professionals don't want to
Speaker 1: pursue her immunity. What they want is for widespread testing
Speaker 1: and tracing and all of the things we've been talking
Speaker 1: about for so long. As you've mentioned, there has been
Speaker 1: really significant criticism of this declaration. I know, one former
Speaker 1: Harvard Medical School professor called it amount to mass murder
Speaker 1: in terms of her immunity. So I was wondering, if
Speaker 1: you might walk us through what makes the ideas proposed
Speaker 1: in this declaration so potentially lethal COVID nineteen experts, mainstream
Speaker 1: public health leaders really come out and condemned this concept.
Speaker 1: You know. The leader of the World Health Organization said
Speaker 1: it was scientifically and ethically problematic and it's never been
Speaker 1: intentionally used as a solution to a pandemic. We had
Speaker 1: a group of eight scientists the other week come out
Speaker 1: and say, you know, this is a dangerous fallacy unsupported
Speaker 1: by scientific evidence in this letter that was published in
Speaker 1: a medical journal called The Lancet and which they actually
Speaker 1: named the John Snow Memorandum. So we're, you know, giving
Speaker 1: big titles to things in this in this scientific debate.
Speaker 1: But I think talking about the science here is sort
Speaker 1: of critical as well. It's it's it's not just a
Speaker 1: moral and ethical dilemma that is being posed by proponents
Speaker 1: of herd imu unity. There's also some gaps in the
Speaker 1: science because we don't totally know that protection from the
Speaker 1: virus is going to be long lasting. In fact, there's
Speaker 1: evidence that antibody levels drop off after a period of
Speaker 1: a few months um, so we don't know that even
Speaker 1: pursuing her immunity is a is a good strategy in
Speaker 1: the big picture, because there are these questions about whether
Speaker 1: protection is even gonna last, and that's something scientists have
Speaker 1: pointed to alongside these other qualms raised with her immunity.
Speaker 1: It's important to be clear that the leading experts we've
Speaker 1: turned to for guidance throughout this pandemic are very much
Speaker 1: against her immunity, and it's being advanced at a time
Speaker 1: when it's more important than ever to be on the
Speaker 1: same page about how to contain the virus that was
Speaker 1: em Core. And that's it for our show today. For
Speaker 1: coverage of the outbreak from one bureaus around the world world,
Speaker 1: visit Bloomberg dot com slash coronavirus and if you like
Speaker 1: the show, please leave us a review and a rating.
Speaker 1: On Apple podcasts or Spotify. It's the best way to
Speaker 1: help more listeners find our global reporting. The Prognosis Daily
Speaker 1: edition is produced by Tophor foreheads Jordan Gospoure, Magnus Hendrickson
Speaker 1: and me Laura Carlson. Today's main story was reported by
Speaker 1: Emma Corp. Original music by Leo Sidrin. Our editors are
Speaker 1: Rick Shine and Francesco Levi. Francesco Levi is Bloomberg's head
Speaker 1: of podcasts. Thanks for listening, BLA