7 years? Better late than never I guess…
American-based international news agency, Bloomberg recently revealed a study on when the Covid-19 pandemic would finally be a thing of the past and they found that it would take up to 7 years for that to be achieved. The study was based on the current vaccine rollout worldwide with an estimation of 7 years till the vaccine is successfully administered to 75% of the world’s population.
For illustrative purposes.
Since the Covid-19 vaccine was found by multiple pharmaceutical companies, Bloomberg has built the world’s biggest database of Covid-19 vaccine shots around the world. As of the time of writing, Bloomberg’s Covid vaccine tracker shows that approximately 128 million doses of the vaccine have inoculated people around the world. Considering there are around 7.7 billion human beings around the world, only a small fraction of the world’s population has been vaccinated with the vaccine.
According to the United States’ top immunologist, Anthony Fauci, it will take 70% to 85% coverage of the world’s population to get vaccinated for things to be able to return to normal. Currently, only Israel have reached that percentage with 75% of its population vaccinated in just two months. Meanwhile, Malaysia will only start vaccinating its citizens starting from the end of this month with priority for frontliners.
Bloomberg’s covid-19 vaccine rollout tracker.
Once mass vaccination is administered, it is hoped that a ‘herd immunity’ will be achieved which will make Covid-19 no longer a tangible threat. However, scientists have differing views as to when herd immunity will kick in. Some researchers believe herd immunity will be achieved once enough people are protected that it bypasses the speed of the virus’ transmission. Other researchers however believed that it will only be achieved when the outbreak can no longer be sustained. For example, there are still cases of measles in our country, but due to herd immunity, its outbreak no longer sends ripples across Malaysia.
While 7 years is still a long time to go, do note that Bloomberg’s study doesn’t account for any level of natural immunity that might result from Covid-19 recovery. This means that if natural immunity were to be achieved, certain places might require a lower percentage of vaccination to make Covid-19 a thing of the past.
What do you guys think of the timeframe for the Covid-19 mass vaccination? Do you think things would be better much faster than expected? Share your thoughts with us in the comments!
Also read: Health DG: Over 4,000 Frontliners Infected With Covid-19
