Antibacterial soap…is it good or bad?
On the one hand, it kills 99.9% of bacteria. On the other hand, it means that only the strongest…the bacterial equivalent of gold medalists…are left alive to reproduce.
It’s easy to see how this can be a double-edged sword. If you’re about to put in your contact lenses, sure, wash your hands with antibacterial soap. If you just came in from mowing the lawn or working on the car, regular soap will be just fine.
We’ve got sort of a similar case brewing with COVID. We currently have a couple of different shots geared to fight the virus. I don’t know that “vaccine” is the best term to use; a vaccine normally prevents you from contracting the disease it was made to combat. (Think Polio, Smallpox, etc.) Today’s shots are just supposed to make sure that if you catch Coronavirus, the symptoms aren’t as bad as they otherwise would be. It’s true that as the shots became widespread, the number of COVID hospitalizations declined, but they don’t do anything to prevent you from contracting the virus. Reduced hospitalizations aren’t proof that the virus stopped spreading, it could just mean that there were fewer severe cases (which is still a positive!).
These shots have limited efficacy. That is, the shots’ symptom-reduction effectiveness wears off over time. We’re still learning about exactly how long it’s effective, but for this discussion let’s say it lasts somewhere between 6 and 10 months. There’s a growing movement to get a booster shot available to the public. Once that’s available, I don’t know for sure, but I would think it would only provide relief for a similar timeframe, meaning that another booster shot is required every 6 to 10 months beyond that point.
So where are we right now? Well, here in the US, we have a growing percentage of adults that have been fully vaccinated. I imagine that means we have a shrinking percentage of adults that have either never received “the jab” or only got a partial dose. I’m a firm believer that we’ll always have some certain percentage of the population that opts not to get stuck. Realistically, I think 100% participation is very far out of reach, especially if you have to convince people to get on board with a solution that apparently only provides a limited-time reduction of symptoms.
Let’s get real here. The virus is going to continue mutating and evolving. It’s a living thing that will try to survive. We have these shots that are temporarily effective, but we will likely someday have a variant of Coronavirus that can overcome our current shots. If a shot is to be effective at stopping the spread of COVID, there are a couple of things we’ll need that we don’t yet have.
The first is a more effective shot. Protection that lasts for only 6-10 months is simply not sustainable. Some people will be very diligent for the rest of their lives in making sure they get a booster every time they hit their window. Others may get one or two, but will stop going after that. My guess is that most people will fall somewhere in the middle. If big numbers of people start skipping the boosters, the overall effort will be rendered less effective.
Second, there needs to be a massive campaign that synchronizes global dosing. Giving everyone the same shot at the same time means global “Coronahealth” is predictable and we could make more definite plans. The problem with that is that it’s a logistical nightmare of epic proportions. Let’s say that every 8 months or so, international organizations administer effective dosages for 7.5-8 billion people. That might someday be possible in countries with well-developed transportation infrastructure, but it would be a herculean lift in more remote areas of the globe where travel is much more difficult or is only possible at certain times of the year. It would certainly be an impressive feat, but even if we do it for a round or two, we’re eventually going to start asking “is this really worth all the effort?”
How about we skip ahead to that point right now? Is today’s madness really worth all the effort? Yes, COVID-19 can be deadly, but in most cases, it’s not. It’s unpleasant and inconvenient, certainly, with many people losing their sense of taste or smell for months, but it’s not as deadly as originally feared.
I’m certainly not an avid consumer of news programs, so I may not be completely accurate about this next part. It seems, though, that all you ever hear about is numbers of new infections. “There were X number of positive COVID tests last week, bringing the cumulative total to doom and gloom.” Well…sure, but then they never follow up after that; they make it seem like that’s the end of the story…all those people are the walking dead and it’s just a matter of time before the virus claims them. My question is: why don’t we hear more data on people that have overcome the virus? How long does their protection typically last? Do average people gain more protection from a low-efficacy shot or from their bodies actually overcoming the virus? To be honest, I don’t know the answer, but it seems like nobody’s asking the question. At a time where “breakthrough cases” are spiking, shouldn’t we be asking some basic questions? Considering all the regular news reports that show thousands of new cases…wouldn’t it be a fantastic development if we learned that only 60% of them had long-lasting immunity after that?
So let’s ask the question: “how do pandemics end?” In order for a disease to die out, it has to run out of new hosts to infect. That can happen in a couple of different ways. 1. Isolate people so that the virus cannot spread from host to host. In the process, every infected person that does not spread the virus becomes a dead end for it. This is why it’s so important to quarantine at the beginning of an outbreak, when it’s still possible to contain it, but it has obvious negative mental health effects that most of us have experienced at some point over the last 18 months. 2. Enough people possess immunity (either natural or synthetic) from the disease that the virus has a hard time finding new, vulnerable hosts to infect. Our current shots don’t provide immunity, so we should be looking down the line to the next generation of medical solutions to provide actual protection from COVID, rather than merely preventing potent symptoms.
I’m inclined to think that a population who received the existing shots is actually prolonging the pandemic. If we could develop a shot that were a true vaccine…something that permanently blocked the virus from infecting the person who received it…that would hasten the end of the pandemic. Biology is funny, though; by introducing a hybrid injection that makes symptoms much more bearable without actually preventing the infection, all we’ve done is give the virus a challenge…something interesting to tackle and overcome. Think Jeff Goldblum from Jurassic Park. “Life finds a way.” I suspect that this course of action will only extend the outbreak by creating a larger number of COVID variants than we otherwise would have had.
In short, you know best what your situation is. If you want to get the shot, I say go for it. If, for whatever reason, you don’t want to, I don’t think anybody should be able to force you to get it, but you really do need to be respectful and responsible with your social behavior in all aspects of life. At all times, assume you’re carrying the virus and that not everyone around you has as hearty an immune system as you do.
Today’s shots are not going to end COVID. This pandemic is still going to be around until it runs out of new people to infect, and infection rates (including breakthrough cases) will probably rise as the cold months approach. Don’t be surprised if the numbers get worse before they get better, but don’t shut the door on the possibility that the rising number of infections may be what eventually causes the drop in new infections.
Keep your head up. It may take some time, but we’ll get through this!