I think people are hoping for a third option: driving the infection rate low enough that it can be contained going forward with testing and contact tracing. Whether it’s realistic to think that can be achieved in an acceptable timeframe, I don’t know.

What about the option of slowing the spread or flattening the curve so it doesn't overwhelm the healthcare system?

My understanding is the end game for that is still a vaccine or herd immunity. It just slows the process down enough that you don’t have more people dying because of a lack of equipment.

So then trying to drive the infection rate too low before reopening could actually be counterproductive because it also slows down the building of herd immunity?

I wouldn't say no to some free generations of exponential growth

> Deaths is not a metric that can determine which stage of this pandemic we are in. Immunity is the figure you're looking for, which will not increase under a shelter-in-place order. Deaths are down, but will immediately shoot back up if the shelter-in-place is lifted.

Absolutely not. If you believe enough information is known about herd-immunity in relation to Corona, you are dangerously misinformed.

Please don't play the "I thought you people were smarter" card if you're being downvoted for spreading misinformation.

Number of deaths DO matter in relation to: 1. Human suffering (perhaps the most important metric) 2. Learning how we prevent further deaths (calculating hospital and materials dissemination needs)

We are VERY FAR from the few responsible re-opening scenarios that exist: https://www.niskanencenter.org/tired-of-the-covid-lockdown-h...

(It it recommended we run 2 million tests a day in the US alone; the current number is 150,000).

I'm spreading misinformation by saying deaths per week won't tell us what stage of the pandemic we're in?

> Number of deaths DO matter in relation to: 1. Human suffering (perhaps the most important metric) 2. Learning how we prevent further deaths (calculating hospital and materials dissemination needs)

Did I ever suggest otherwise? Literally all I said about "number of deaths" was that it does not tell us how close we are to the pandemic being over. You just brought up a bunch of other stuff to feel good about yourself.

I really did think you people were smarter though. Apparently you haven't even learned how to read something before you reply to it.

> If you believe enough information is known about herd-immunity in relation to Corona, you are dangerously misinformed.

Again, I never said anything about this. Please learn how to read. I'm not claiming to know how we reach the level of "herd immunity" we need to get out of this. I just said "herd immunity" or a vaccine would be the solution here. Am I wrong about that? Jesus fucking christ, the only thing HN does better than Reddit is self-righteousness and smug asshats.

I'm not so much mad, more sad. It's unfortunate to see commenters who go around trying to dunk on people instead of constructively contributing.

There is no evidence that getting infected with covid19 gives anyone immunity. There are already documented cases of People have been infected twice.

Herd immunity would be nice - but so far none of the known coronavirus infections grant immunity. Herd immunity cries will only kill innocent people.

Herd immunity is more a myth than a fact right now.

People not getting COVID-19 immunity after recovery seems an extraordinary claim that would require very strong evidence for me to take seriously.

How do you believe people recover from COVID-19?

The fact that you recover from it at all, and generate measurable antibodies in the process, and that humans generally gain some level of immunity to all the other coronaviruses we're plagued by weights my belief strongly towards at least short term immunity being very likely.

I downvoted because I'm not currently aware of a current usable metric for immunity and because you didn't link to one. It's obvious to me too that the pandemic isn't over but deaths is (to my knowledge) the best proxy for all the other metrics that we currently have, due to lack of consistent testing.