Getting Through the Pandemic in Europe in the Winter of 2020/21: The Misuse of COVID-19 Herd Immunity Argument

To summarize, our emphasis needs to be on using successful timely virus suppression strategies for getting through to summer while rolling out effective new vaccines. The economic and social costs of lockdown are considerable. Governments should support those hardest hit with income support and sustainable economic recovery packages. This pandemic should be handled through community adoption of NPIs, reinforced by ensuing vaccination strategies when available and any other scientific developments alongside the many that have been rapidly developed so far. The advocates of natural herd immunity are voices that must be heard so that their questions can be answered and their assertions countered. They also remind us to look at the wider and enduring social, economic, and human costs of the pandemic. Yet, as presented the natural herd immunity argument, is not currently supported by scientific evidence, its achievement is still far away and might hit especially vulnerable groups, thus creating moral and ethical problems. The proposed strategies of herd immunity supporters must not be heeded as they well may be the siren voices that lead unsuspecting audiences onto the rocks. It is dangerous, and unfounded in the science, to advocate use of herd immunity as a means to pandemic control at this time.