Last August, I estimated that Covid-19 will end its epidemic phase in India by January 2021. It appears that this prediction was not too far off the mark.
Paul Alexander, a senior adviser at the Department of Health and Humans Services, encouraged adoption of a policy to increase the number of infections among young adults.
Epidemiologist Anders Tegnell says herd immunity does slow down virus transmission but it hasn't been clear to what extent the rates are reduced and how large that effect it.
The study, yet to be peer-reviewed, analysed multiple types of immune cells in 185 Covid cases, including 41 patients who had recovered before the study.
The investigation, conducted by the Federation of American Scientists, found a 'high-level of bot-like behaviour' in support of the Great Barrington Declaration on social media.
Looking at the trajectories of the Covid pandemic, there doesn’t seem to be enough evidence to make confident pronouncements about what the real-world herd immunity threshold is.
The US desperately needs a solid strategy unlike what the Trump administration has in place — doing almost nothing and telling people the disease will go away.
While global corporations setting up GCCs in India continue to express confidence in availability of skilled AI engineers, the panel argued that India’s real challenge lies elsewhere.
Taylor ‘Fema’ Hiester, commander of USAF F-16 Viper Demo Team, hit out at air show organisers for continuing with the show after Wing Commander Namansh Syal lost his life in the incident.
It is a brilliant, reasonably priced, and mostly homemade aircraft with a stellar safety record; only two crashes in 24 years since its first flight. But its crash is a moment of introspection.
Pseudointellectualism at its best!
It is easy to run models and give out meaningless predictions.
Thanks for your back of the envelope calculations… evolutionary biology is much more complicated than that.
So I was Googling to see who predicted in January that India wouldn’t have a second wave, and THIS popped up… seriously, this has to be one of the worst predictions of all time. The irony, though, is that the model was right about one thing: as a whole, the country probably does have a 75% pre-infection rate. But what this really shows is that natural immunity means absolutely nothing against the new variants. This is a stark lesson for the rest of the world. I don’t know if anybody else is paying attention, but I sure am.
This Post didn’t time well. All these Statistical experts and their predictions are no better than roadside astrologers. When we had the burning example of US, Germany, UK, France, Italy, Brazil in front of us etc we should have been much much more careful, it was really a matter of time before the 2nd wave hit us and that’s exactly what happened. Even if we see statistically also, we were supposed to get hit by the 2nd wave a few months later like how it happened in those countries and we did. The pattern is exactly same.
This calculation builds on the premise that people develop long-term immunity from Covid-19 once exposed to SARS Cov-2 virus. This is not true and most research shows that antibody levels significantly drop after the third month. Even with the vaccine, we do not know what is the duration of immunity with estimates ranging from 6-7 months to 2-years. This means asymptomatic cases will not automatically offer immunity to the people. Also, herd immunity? That term is used only in case of vaccination, not asymptomatic infections;
What about the lapse of immunity? The immunity is known to last for about six months after which it wanes. We have had our peak in September so the immunity will start fading in populations starting February. Your model doesn’t factor in this fact. I think the only way to be out of this epidemic is to continue the safety precautions like social distancing and wearing masks. This along with aggressive vaccination of vulnerable populations.
This is bullshit. It is highly concerning that more than a 100M people have contacted the virus. This provides the virus ample amount of opportunity to undergo transformation and develop a more deadly and contagious strain successfully. The author’s model doesn’t seem to capture that, which is the biggest flaw in its approach. You cannot ignore biology when building models to run different scenarios on your model. We might see more than 3-4 waves of Covid due to the mutated strain.
I wish more people read comments like yours than such foolhardy opinion pieces…
Absolutely don’t believe in this statistical model. I am from Pune, which has a population of 44 lacs and reported cases of 1.83 lacs. If I multiply 1.83 by 20, then the seropositivity in Pune comes to around 83.2% (36.6/44). If it’s true, then Pune shouldn’t be reporting any new cases. But the fact of the matter is that Pune still has a very high positivity rate of 8-9%, which is the highest among any Indian cities, and it’s still reporting 300 cases per day on an average. So better to be safe and get yourself vaccinated whenever a vaccine becomes available for the general public.
All this statistical modelling is based on assumptions. Fact is many people are locked up at home in India. once schools,colleges and corporate workplaces, transport are fully open we will know true picture.
Crazy analysis
How is this article still online??
Pseudointellectualism at its best!
It is easy to run models and give out meaningless predictions.
Thanks for your back of the envelope calculations… evolutionary biology is much more complicated than that.
Stay safe, Mr. Pai!!!
So I was Googling to see who predicted in January that India wouldn’t have a second wave, and THIS popped up… seriously, this has to be one of the worst predictions of all time. The irony, though, is that the model was right about one thing: as a whole, the country probably does have a 75% pre-infection rate. But what this really shows is that natural immunity means absolutely nothing against the new variants. This is a stark lesson for the rest of the world. I don’t know if anybody else is paying attention, but I sure am.
ab kya hua bhai ? where are you hiding ?
This Post didn’t time well. All these Statistical experts and their predictions are no better than roadside astrologers. When we had the burning example of US, Germany, UK, France, Italy, Brazil in front of us etc we should have been much much more careful, it was really a matter of time before the 2nd wave hit us and that’s exactly what happened. Even if we see statistically also, we were supposed to get hit by the 2nd wave a few months later like how it happened in those countries and we did. The pattern is exactly same.
Lol! I hope no one takes you too seriously after this article.
Umm…..what about now?
This calculation builds on the premise that people develop long-term immunity from Covid-19 once exposed to SARS Cov-2 virus. This is not true and most research shows that antibody levels significantly drop after the third month. Even with the vaccine, we do not know what is the duration of immunity with estimates ranging from 6-7 months to 2-years. This means asymptomatic cases will not automatically offer immunity to the people. Also, herd immunity? That term is used only in case of vaccination, not asymptomatic infections;
What about the lapse of immunity? The immunity is known to last for about six months after which it wanes. We have had our peak in September so the immunity will start fading in populations starting February. Your model doesn’t factor in this fact. I think the only way to be out of this epidemic is to continue the safety precautions like social distancing and wearing masks. This along with aggressive vaccination of vulnerable populations.
This is bullshit. It is highly concerning that more than a 100M people have contacted the virus. This provides the virus ample amount of opportunity to undergo transformation and develop a more deadly and contagious strain successfully. The author’s model doesn’t seem to capture that, which is the biggest flaw in its approach. You cannot ignore biology when building models to run different scenarios on your model. We might see more than 3-4 waves of Covid due to the mutated strain.
I wish more people read comments like yours than such foolhardy opinion pieces…
Absolutely don’t believe in this statistical model. I am from Pune, which has a population of 44 lacs and reported cases of 1.83 lacs. If I multiply 1.83 by 20, then the seropositivity in Pune comes to around 83.2% (36.6/44). If it’s true, then Pune shouldn’t be reporting any new cases. But the fact of the matter is that Pune still has a very high positivity rate of 8-9%, which is the highest among any Indian cities, and it’s still reporting 300 cases per day on an average. So better to be safe and get yourself vaccinated whenever a vaccine becomes available for the general public.
All this statistical modelling is based on assumptions. Fact is many people are locked up at home in India. once schools,colleges and corporate workplaces, transport are fully open we will know true picture.
The view is correct. Look at Bihar election and current kishan protest in Delhi. There is no mask, social distance, but still they are there.
…and still???