Issue link: https://beckershealthcare.uberflip.com/i/1311112
39 FINANCE CMO / CARE DELIVERY 5,300 physicians, scientists: Herd immunity as virus management is a 'dangerous fallacy' By Molly Gamble T housands of scientists, researchers and healthcare professionals have signed the John Snow Memorandum de- nouncing herd immunity as "a dangerous fal- lacy unsupported by scientific evidence." e stance comes in response to the Great Bar- rington Declaration, authored by three epide- miologists in early October. Citing their con- cerns about the damaging physical and mental health effects of current COVID-19 lockdown policies, the trio put forth an approach for vi- rus control called "focused protection." e proposal aims to minimize mortality and so- cial harm by allowing young people to resume life as normal — including attending school and work in person — to build herd immunity, while encouraging older people and those who are medically vulnerable to isolate. A group of international researchers with ex- pertise in public health, epidemiology, medi- cine, pediatrics, sociology, virology, infectious disease, health systems, psychology, psychiatry, health policy and mathematical modeling came together to dra the John Snow Memorandum, which said that "any pandemic management strategy relying upon immunity from natural infections for COVID-19 is flawed." "e arrival of a second wave and the real- ization of the challenges ahead has led to renewed interest in a so-called herd immu- nity approach, which suggests allowing a large uncontrolled outbreak in the low-risk population while protecting the vulnerable. Proponents suggest this would lead to the de- velopment of infection-acquired population immunity in the low-risk population, which will eventually protect the vulnerable. is is a dangerous fallacy unsupported by scientific evidence," the memo read. e memorandum is named aer a British physician known as the "father of epidemiol- ogy" and oen credited with bringing an end to an 1854 cholera outbreak in London. It was first published in e Lancet. Its publication coincided with remarks from Anthony Fauci, MD, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who denounced the Great Barrington Declaration in an interview with Yahoo News, asserting that it would result in many avoidable deaths. "In our community, maybe a third of the pop- ulation — depending on how you figure it — are vulnerable and would be prone to getting serious complications from COVID-19 dis- ease," said Dr. Fauci. "You have the elderly, obese people, people with underlying con- ditions like heart disease, diabetes and other conditions. If you let infections rip, as it were, and say, 'Let everybody get infected that is go- ing to be able to get infected, and then we'll have herd immunity,' — quite frankly that is nonsense. Anybody who knows anything about epidemiology will tell you that that is nonsense and very dangerous. What will hap- pen, if you do that, by the time you get to herd immunity you will have killed a lot of people that would have been avoidable." n © 2020 United HealthCare Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved. PCA-2-20-02559-Clinical-FLYR_10022020 Due to COVID-19, some patients may be hesitant to get a flu shot. UnitedHealthcare is here to help with resources to support your practice. • Encouraging $0 vaccinations for most UnitedHealthcare plan members • Using standing orders to help streamline workfl ow • Providing access to resources to help you address any challenges To learn more, visit UHCprovider.com/fl u 2020 flu season resources