Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe - The New York Times
▻https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/03/health/covid-herd-immunity-vaccine.html
Unnerving scenarios remain on the path to this long-term vision.
Over time, if not enough people are protected, highly contagious #variants may develop that can break through vaccine protection, land people in the hospital and put them at risk of death.
“That’s the nightmare scenario,” said Jeffrey Shaman, an epidemiologist at Columbia University.
How frequent and how severe those breakthrough infections are have the potential to determine whether the United States can keep hospitalizations and deaths low or if the country will find itself in a “mad scramble” every couple of years, he said.