Privacy Preference Center

Herd immunity is not stopping the spread of the novel coronavirus in Sweden, an official in the country said this week. 

“The issue of herd immunity is difficult,” Anders Tegnell, Sweden’s top epidemiologist, said at a briefing in Stockholm on Tuesday, according to Bloomberg. “We see no signs of immunity in the population that are slowing down the infection right now.”

Sweden did not impose a nationwide lockdown, with officials in the country instead relying on “voluntary measures,” per Bloomberg, which cited figures that show Swedes have had more COVID-19 exposure than residents in other countries in the Nordic region. 

Some have called Sweden’s response to the virus a “disaster,” while other experts, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, top infectious disease expert in the U.S., who has proclaimed the concept of herd immunity to be “nonsense and very dangerous.”

AMERICANS SHOULD BE WARNED OF CORONAVIRUS VACCINE SIDE EFFECTS, MEDICAL EXPERTS SAY

“Quite frankly, that is nonsense and anybody who knows anything about epidemiology will tell you that that is nonsense and very dangerous,” Fauci said. 

(His comments came after Daniel Klaidman, editor in chief at Yahoo News, questioned whether herd immunity were a viable strategy in the U.S., citing The Great Barrington Declaration and reports that some White House officials have embraced the approach. The Declaration, penned by professors at Harvard, Oxford and Stanford universities, calls  for “focused protection” by letting young, low-risk populations carry on with their lives and naturally becoming infected while protecting those at high risk.) 

In an interview with New Statesman in October, Tegnell defended his country’s response to the virus. 

“In common with other countries we’re trying to slow down the spread as much as possible. … To imply that we let the disease run free without any measures to try to stop it is not true,” Tegnell told the publication at the time. 

CLICK HERE FOR FULL CORONAVIRUS COVERAGE

“I want to make it clear, no, we did not lockdown like many other countries, but we definitely had a virtual lockdown,” Tegnell continued. “Swedes changed their behavior enormously. We stopped traveling even more than our neighboring countries. The airports had no flights anywhere, the trains were running at a few percent of normal service, so there were enormous changes in society.”

To date, Sweden has recorded more than 230,000 virus cases and roughly 6,500 deaths from the disease, according to estimates from Johns Hopkins University. 

Fox News’ Kayla Rivas contributed to this report. 

• In an interview about coronavirus vaccines and COVID-19 prevention, a Moderna executive said current data does not yet prove that vaccines prevent a person from being infectious after contracting the virus.
• Tal Zaks told Axios that the drug prevents people from getting severely ill or even sick at all when catching COVID-19, but it’s unclear if they can still spread the disease.
• Infection after vaccination is still a possibility, but the goal of vaccines is to prevent severe illness that can lead to life-threatening complications.

Three novel coronavirus vaccines have shown they can prevent COVID-19 infection or severe illness. These are the Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, and AstraZeneca/Oxford drugs that proved they can deliver the expected immune response in patients, which would reduce the risk of severe COVID-19 and death. As Dr. Anthony Fauci explained recently, that’s going to be the first goal of vaccines, not blocking infection completely. Some vaccines may be able to stop the infection, but others won’t and that’s fine. What they will do is prevent the virus from doing the kind of damage seen in people who develop severe COVID-19. Various immune system components created after vaccination, like neutralizing antibodies and coronavirus-specific B and T cells, will allow the body to fight the pathogen from the moment it enters the body instead of after it has already begun replicating rapidly.

This means vaccinated people who carry the virus might still be infectious to others. Moderna’s chief medical officer Tal Zaks made that point clear in an interview, saying that the data can’t yet prove that a vaccine will stop individuals from spreading the disease.

Powecom KN95 masks are FDA-authorized and certified by NIOSH to work even better than most 3M N95 masks! List Price:$26.25 Price:$22.31 You Save:$3.94 (15%) Available from Amazon, BGR may receive a commission Buy Now

Zaks spoke to Axios about Moderna’s mRNA drug which proved to be 94.5% effective according to interim data from the company’s Phase 3 trial. When discussing vaccines for children, Zaks said he estimates that kids will be able to get COVID-19 vaccines at some point in the middle of 2021, adding that he hopes they’ll get it before the next school year. His answer led to a second question from Axios that asked specifically if unvaccinated children can return to schools once the staff is vaccinated.

That’s when Zaks made it clear exactly what it means when someone is vaccinated, according to the data available so far.

“I think we need to be careful, as we get vaccinated, not to over-interpret the results,” the Moderna exec said. “Our results show that this vaccine can prevent you from being sick and can prevent you from being severely sick. They do not show that they prevent you from potentially carrying this virus transiently and infecting others.”

Zaks continued, “When we start the deployment of this vaccine, we will not have sufficient, concrete data to prove that this vaccine reduces transmission. Do I believe it reduces transmission? Absolutely, yes. And I say this because of the science. But absent proof, I think it’s important that we don’t change behaviors solely on the basis of vaccination.”

Health experts including Dr. Anthony Fauci have said a number of times that current health measures will remain in place once vaccinations start, and they’ll have to be observed at least until the end of 2021. Face masks and social distancing will be required for people who are vaccinated as well, and that’s because the vaccines won’t be 100% effective. Some people will still get sick and might develop a more serious form of the illness.

Zaks’s answer adds another piece to the puzzle. If a vaccinated person contracts the virus and can be infectious to others, he or she will have to wear protective gear. While the exec referred to the drug that Moderna conceived, it’s likely the same will be true of other vaccines. The vaccine makers and public health experts managing vaccination campaigns will probably have more answers once the vaccines are ready to roll out.

But even if a vaccinated individual can contract the virus and is infectious to others, he or she would likely be infectious for a shorter period of time. Current guidelines say a person with COVID-19 is infectious 2-3 days before the onset of symptoms and for as long as 8-10 days after that. A vaccine would teach the immune system how to kill the virus prior to an infection, so the pathogen will be neutralized much faster. This would reduce the virus’s ability to multiply rapidly — and the less virus that’s in the body, the less infectious a person would be.

The bottom line is that vaccines will reduce the spread of the virus. If vaccinated individuals who catch COVID-19 are indeed still infectious, it will be for a much shorter period. And it goes without saying that the more people get vaccinated, the quicker the virus will stop spreading in communities.

The Axios segment about COVID-19 prevention after vaccination follows below.

Chris Smith started writing about gadgets as a hobby, and before he knew it he was sharing his views on tech stuff with readers around the world. Whenever he’s not writing about gadgets he miserably fails to stay away from them, although he desperately tries. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing.