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--- gideon_meyerowitz-katz [2022/10/04 07:42]
pamela
+++ gideon_meyerowitz-katz [2022/10/04 08:10] (current)
pamela [Pharma Shill 2020]
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 Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz is an epidemiologist working in chronic disease in Sydney's west, with a particular focus on diabetes. He writes a weekly blog on public health, policy, and science communication-particularly where these things go wrong. He has recently begun a PhD with the University of Wollongong researching the social determinants of diabetes, and is passionate about the social causes of our ill health. ((https://web.archive.org/web/20200411111948/https://www.acsh.org/profile/gideon-meyerowitz-katz))
-** ACSH is a legacy Front Group for big tobacco & toxic chemicals featured in San Francisco Uni's Legacy Tobacco Archive ((https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/American_Council_on_Science_and_Health)) ((https://web.archive.org/web/20121018225852/https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/American_Council_on_Science_and_Health))
+NOTE ->> ACSH is a legacy Front Group for big tobacco & toxic chemicals featured in San Francisco Uni's Legacy Tobacco Archive ((https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/American_Council_on_Science_and_Health)) ((https://web.archive.org/web/20121018225852/https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/American_Council_on_Science_and_Health))
 === Huffington Post Bio ===
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 ((http://www.epimonitor.net/Australian-Epi-Blogger.htm))
+==== Pharma Shill 2020 ====
+Herd immunity for COVID-19 is still a terrible idea
+Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz - 1/09/2020 5:39:16 PM
+{{ ::gideon_katz_herd_immunity_bad_jab_good.png?600|}}
+Epidemiologist Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz wants to dispel myths about herd immunity and coronavirus without a vaccine.
+The basic idea of herd immunity is simple – if enough people are immune to a disease, then even if a person comes into the community carrying the illness, they won’t spread it. The few people who aren’t immune are protected because most of the people they interact with are immune and so they can’t get the disease.
+This works really well if you have a vaccination for infections. Measles, for example, used to cause massive outbreaks and kill hundreds of thousands a year, but in most countries cannot spread further than a few kids these days. That’s herd immunity at work, and it’s a wonderful thing to see.
+The problem with COVID-19 is that we don’t have a vaccine. To be immune to the disease, you have to get it and then recover, and **we know that coronavirus kills a pretty scary proportion of people who get it.**
+We’ve known this for months. So why are people suddenly saying that herd immunity is just around the corner?
+Speculative science
+There are actually two arguments that have been going around implying that herd immunity is almost here.
+The first is pretty simple, and very obviously wrong: that 50% of people are already immune to COVID-19 due to pre-existing T cell reactions that were probably caused by other coronaviruses (the ones that cause the common cold).
+This, the idea goes, means that only a few percent need to catch the disease to reach the herd immunity threshold, and so we’re probably already there and there’s nothing more to worry about.
+While it’s a popular line, it makes very little sense for a number of reasons. If nothing else, we already know, from superspreading events, that most people can catch COVID-19 if they are exposed and that pre-existing [[:T cells]] might make COVID-19 less deadly, but it certainly doesn’t make you immune. ((https://web.archive.org/web/20201101020642/https://www1.racgp.org.au/newsgp/gp-opinion/herd-immunity-for-covid-19-is-still-a-terrible-ide))
 ==== War on Ivermectin ====