This is the most recent WHO statement on hybrid immunity for Covid that I can find, from mid-2022. (Would be…

This is the most recent WHO statement on hybrid immunity for Covid that I can find, from mid-2022. (Would be interested to know if there’s a later one.) What stands out is that the WHO is not at all sure it’s the way out of this pandemic. /1 https://t.co/Z88gxo5J83

There are so many complexities around using hybrid immunity as a route to herd immunity, which appears to be the current goal across most countries. The WHO mentions just some of those in its statement. (I’d still like to know if that approach has ever been successful, for…/2

…any disease). Mindful that it’s likely more political strategy masquerading as public health method. But even in the most basic ways, to achieve anything like herd immunity (another deeply problematic idea, in a hypermobile world), you surely need a whole lot of things…/3

…to line up, in ways that seem impossible. People need to be infected with the same variants, at the same time, that infection needs to spread evenly throughout society without missing key groups, that infection needs to provide some sort of lasting immunity, etc. /4

None of those things seem possible on current experience, or even from first principles. And vaccination programs are being wound down, so to what extent any immunity we’re seeing is even hybrid anyway is an open question. Also not to forget the fantasy idea of isolating…/5

…millions of ‘vulnerable’ people while all of this dance goes on. Something that isn’t even happening anyway. /end