The Netherlands
will aim to develop immunity to coronavirus among its population by
allowing large numbers to contract the illness at a controlled pace,
prime minister Mark Rutte announced in a national address on Monday.
“The reality is that in the near
future a large part of the Dutch population will be infected with the
virus,” Mr Rutte said. “We can slow down the spread of the virus while
building controlled group immunity.”
“It can take months or even longer
to build group immunity, and during that time we need to shield people
at greater risk as much as possible.”
The idea of developing group
immunity to coronavirus, also known as Covid-19, is controversial. It
has been supported by Sweden’s state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell and Britain’s chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallence. But the World Health Organisation (WHO) has questioned its basis in evidence.
“We don’t know enough about the
science of this virus, it hasn’t been in our population for long enough
for us to know what it does in immunological terms,” said WHO
spokeswoman Dr Margaret Harris.
“Every virus functions differently
in your body and stimulates a different immunological profile. We can
talk theories, but at the moment we are really facing a situation where
we have got to look at action.”
Limited evidence
Dr Judith Wasserheit,
chair of the University of Washington department of global health and
co-director of the MetaCenter for Pandemic Preparedness and Global
Health Security, said there is limited evidence for the approach and
that it would be difficult to protect the vulnerable.
“It would be quite challenging to
separate older adults from potentially infectious younger members of the
population,” Dr Wasserheit said.
“In addition, we do not know how
frequently immunity occurs after infection with this virus, and if it
occurs, how strong that immunity is and how long it lasts.”
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/coronavirus-dutch-adopt-controversial-herd-immunity-strategy-1.4204578
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