[GoodLife]

If you read my "Herd Immunity may be closer than you think" thread, you will understand this one easily.

Based on some scientific research by Nobel Laureate Michael Levitt of Stanford and others, herd immunity for this virus may be reached at 30%. Based on CDC Director Redfield statement that asymptomatic cases are 10 times number of confirmed cases, and new research that states T-cell immunity is double the number of asymptomatics, there is an easy formula to predict when the 30% herd immunity threshold will be reached.

Confirmed cases x 10 x 2 divided by total population = current immunity percentage



New cases in Florida have gone up by more than 50,000 in the last week. I calculated a week ago that Florida was at a 15% immunity level. It is now just over 20%.

Confirmed cases 213,794 x 10 x 2 = 4,275,880/20,600,000 = 20.7%

If new cases continue at 50,000 or so per week Florida should reach 30% herd immunity threshold (using my formula) before the end of July. If the hypothesis is correct, new cases will start dropping quickly by end of July and this will be pretty much over by September. I could be wrong, but the data from New York shows a lot evidence that this is correct. They have no spike and new cases have been plummeting for several weeks there. They opened most of New York two weeks after Florida did (NYC 1 month ago) and no spikes at all. I calculated their current herd immunity level at 41% so they reached 30% several weeks ago.

So if you are 65+ or have certain health issues, continue to stay safe and be happy. Stress is bad for your immune system.

We should not see a lot of deaths from this surge, it's mostly younger people who don't die. So far only 99 people under age 44 have died from covid 19 in Florida. 2% of the death total and under 44s represent 53% of all confirmed cases. Median age of new cases is mid 30s. They are more likely to die from the flu. 85% of deaths in Florida are 65+ and they only represent 14% of total cases.

Don't Worry Be Happy Stay Safe

[GoodLife]

I reverse engineered my formula to see how well it works for New York City.

Population 8,000,000 x 30% = 2,400,000

2,400,000 divided by 2 = 1,200,000 divided by 10 = 120,000

So 120,000 confirmed cases needed to reach 30% immunity threshold

120,000 x 10 (asymptomatics) x2 (T cell immunes) = 2,400,000 = 30% of population

Then I looked for date New York City reached 120,000 confirmed cases.

April 15



According to the graph, cases peaked from April 5 to April 12, then started to decline rapidly.

[Two Bills]

Another point of view.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/l...483-5/fulltext

[Gulfcoast]

I hope that you are right Goodlife. I'm ready to be done with this pandemic and all of the associated rules & regs that have come along with it!

[GoodLife]

Originally Posted by Two Bills

Another point of view.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/l...483-5/fulltext

That appears to be just an antibody study and in their conclusion they state: One in three infections seems to be asymptomatic, while a substantial number of symptomatic cases remained untested. Despite the high impact of COVID-19 in Spain, prevalence estimates remain low and are clearly insufficient to provide herd immunity.

Antibody studies are tricky, our own CDC Director Redfield stated recently that Asymptomatics are 10 times number of confirmed cases. He's looked at a lot of studies. This Spanish study admits there are substantially more than they found.

Also, antibody tests do not show T cell immunes, that's a different kind of test and recent studies show T cell immunes are double the number of asymptomatics. That's how I built the equation confirmed cases x 10 (asymptomatic) x 2 (T cell) = total herd immunity level.

The fact that New York City reached 120,000 (see post #2) cases exactly as cases peaked there in mid April and then new cases began plummeting is powerful evidence that herd immunity threshold of 30% was reached. I did not know the dat NYC reached that number of cases, I just reversed the formula to find out how many actual cases were needed to produce 30% immunity. Then I looked up the date they reached it. Bingo, it was April 15, the end of the week cases peaked there and then started plummeting. The fact that New York has not seen any new spike despite reopening a month ago and also having huge protests is also powerful evidence. Real data is the strongest evidence you can have and its pretty clear looking at New York data that they have reached Michael Levitt's 30% threshold for immunity. Don't try and tell me New York has no spike because they are stricter at reopening, there are lots of photos and videos of maskless New Yorkers at bars etc. They've had 25,000 complaints about violations in the first week after reopening.

If New York City starts getting huge spikes in new cases or if Florida does not stop spiking by end of this month then I'll go back to the drawing board. Won't take long to know.

[Bay Kid]

More testing now. Hopefully this will improve in November.

[GoodLife]

Another set of data people are looking at with curiosity is Asia, and why the Asian countries have had remarkably fewer deaths per million than Europe, USA, Brazil etc.

Here is a list of Asian countries and those bordering China



If you look on the right side for the column marked deaths per million, you can see that the very highest death rate per million is 23, many are below 10. How can this be? Many European countries have death rates of 500-600 per million, USA is just under 400 per million.

So why did all these Asian countries fare so much better?

They all wore masks: Nope, some of these countries do, and some don't

They locked down better: Nope, some of them didn't even lock down at all,



The virus has changed: There are no studies that say the virus has become more lethal. One study that says the virus became more contagious has been criticized by many and actually does not prove anything. Dr. Scott Gottlieb, the former head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, also urged caution about the Los Alamos study. While he identified the mutation as a new strain, he said he has his doubts that the virus is now more transferable. “It (the study) doesn’t prove that this new strain is, in fact, more infectious,” Gottlieb said on CNBC's Squawk Box

So what could it be? Some think proximity to China and other coronaviruses has given these populations a higher level of built in immunity. The low numbers point to something other than mitigation efforts etc

[tophcfa]

Herd immunity only works for us if we have the immunity. And we don't want to get the immunity by getting Covid-19. I will wait for a proven vaccination to be universally available before I consider herd immunity being achieved, thanks.

[Gulfcoast]

I don't know that China, in particular, has been honest about their numbers. I also think that there has been an incentive for hospitals in certain areas of this country to really tally up those Coronavirus numbers.

The numbers have been all over the board and, quite frankly, will never make complete sense.

[GoodLife]

Originally Posted by tophcfa

Herd immunity only works for us if we have the immunity. And we don't want to get the immunity by getting Covid-19. I will wait for a proven vaccination to be universally available before I consider herd immunity being achieved, thanks.

Apparently you missed a few things in my posts.

You do not need to catch covid 19 if the herd immunity threshold is only 30% as postulated by Nobel Prize winner Michael Levitt of Stanford. Repeat: You do not have to catch covid 19 in order for herd immunity to take effect.

Not all immunity is held by people who have "caught" the virus.

Actual data from New York and other countries show that the virus is not exponential but follows a rising trajectory of cases and deaths which then fall after a certain percentage of inhabitants are infected.

I have repeated cautioned my fellow old fogies and other people at risk to follow safe practices and avoid all interactions possible during this surge. I practice what I preach.

I believe we will reach Levitt's 30% threshold before any vaccine is available.

Read the title of this post again

Don't Worry, Be Happy, Stay Safe