People don't fully understand how bad herd immunity is. Vaccine is a much better option in terms of the amount of people dead / sick / etc.
vaccines and herd immunity rely on the exact same mechanism: the immune system develops anti-bodies that recognize the proteins protruding from the virus
Not even talking about the overflowing hospitals we would have if we went about doing this.
no evidence exists that any such thing would happen. evidence quite to the contrary does (countries with high death rates were simply recording SARS-Cov2 deaths incorrectly, the actual typical death rate is similar to that of seasonal influenza)
it's a basic fact of epidemiology that deadly pathogens don't spread well, and that as pathogens become more benign they spread faster, e.g.
- ebola, guarantee of death is high, spread very poorly
- influenza, very low death rate, spreads so pervasively that it's a fact of life for everyone
sorry to interrupt your death-cult doomsday nonsense, but the facts are (sadly) quite simple
70-80 % of people have to get the Coronavirus for herd immunity to be effective, right? That means that there are going to be a massive increase in the amount of hospitalizations, infections, deaths, and so on and so forth.
Even in the most conservative estimates of hospitalizations, with 70% of the population getting it, you'd still be overflowing hospitals and having some people dying solely due to the overflow.
However, there are some major problems with relying on community infection to create herd immunity to the virus that causes COVID-19. First, it isn't yet clear if infection with the COVID-19 virus makes a person immune to future infection.
Research suggests that after infection with some coronaviruses, reinfection with the same virus — though usually mild and only happening in a fraction of people — is possible after a period of months or years. Further research is needed to determine the protective effect of antibodies to the virus in those who have been infected.
Even if infection with the COVID-19 virus creates long-lasting immunity, a large number of people would have to become infected to reach the herd immunity threshold. Experts estimate that in the U.S., 70% of the population — more than 200 million people — would have to recover from COVID-19 to halt the epidemic. If many people become sick with COVID-19 at once, the health care system could quickly become overwhelmed. This amount of infection could also lead to serious complications and millions of deaths, especially among older people and those who have chronic conditions.
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