8 ms·

San Francisco may be first major US city to hit herd immunity, experts say

60 points by drx 5y ago

peter303 5y ago
Great! Hope the rest of the US and World catches up soon.
minimaxir 5y ago
The interesting thing about San Francisco now is that people still wear their masks outdoors despite all the excellent news and the number of new cases going down. Not that that's a bad thing. It'll be interesting to see what happens on June 15 when the mask mandate goes away in CA (theoretically).
- gopalv 5y ago
  > people still wear their masks outdoors despite all the excellent news The whole spring pollen thing hasn't hit me in any way this year - the cottonwood seeds are also in the air. I notice that I don't feel as bad about all of that with an N95 this year, though I'm conserving some N95s for the eventual fire season this year.
- thrav 5y ago
  I’m sure there will still be a good number of people wearing them places like stores for a while, since we get so many tourists. I’d bet people continue to think, “why not?”, while it’s still spreading. Most people spend 99% of their time with friends, family, or trusted coworkers anyway.
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  "The interesting thing about San Francisco now is that people still wear their masks outdoors" This probably depends a lot on the neighborhood. I'd be curious to know what percentage of people in poor neighborhoods like the Tenderloin and in homeless encampments (who are some of the most vulnerable) are wearing masks.
- annoyingnoob 5y ago
  I believe that Cal/OSHA will still require masks indoors unless everyone inside is vaccinated. Edit: "Indoors, fully vaccinated workers without COVID-19 symptoms do not need to wear face coverings in a room where everyone else is fully vaccinated and not showing symptoms. However, where there is a mixture of vaccinated and unvaccinated persons in a room, all workers will continue to be required to wear a face covering." https://www.dir.ca.gov/DIRNews/2021/2021-58.html https://www.dir.ca.gov/DIRNews/2021/2021-58.html
- throwkeep 5y ago
  That's bizarre because we've known for a long time now that Covid doesn't really spread outside. Doubly bizarre if vaccinated.
  - annoyingnoob 5y ago
    I think its social pressure. Prior to covid we always called masks PPE or Personal Protective Equipment, and you wore PPE mostly to protect yourself. When covid hit we told everyone to wear PPE but that you were doing so to protect everyone else and not yourself - that you needed to rely on everyone else wearing masks to protect yourself. So we end up with social pressure to wear masks and you wear one to show that you are doing the right thing.
- newacct583 5y ago
  The new cases going down are at least partially because of continued mitigation work. I genuinely don't understand the anti-mask mania, I really don't. Mask use is almost free. Virtually no activities are precluded by wearing a mask (even eating, frankly, just lift it up and put it back to chew). Masks should be the first mitigation rule enforced in a respiratory disease environment and the last one relaxed. Restaurant and event closures, quarantines, travel restrictions, testing requirements, vaccine registries... All of those have significant real costs and should be done only when masks aren't sufficient. And they should all be relaxed first before we give up masks. But yet, everyone points to masks as somehow the opposite: in the minds of so many people (even seemingly scientifically literate people here) they're the worst thing imaginable, and... why? They're just masks. Wear 'em. It's cheap and easy.
  - hamandcheese 5y ago
    They are annoying to wear. They make my beard itch. They make my glasses fog up. They make me feel overheated if it's warm out. My airflow feels noticeably restricted if I am exercising, even with ordinary non-N95 masks. They are easy to lose track of, which is highly annoying when I am otherwise ready to leave my apartment. Masks fucking suck.
    - newacct583 5y ago
      Whole careers are spent wearing masks, though. I mean, fine. I find them mildly annoying and you think they're the devil's work. But we both agree that we should be opening restaurants and theaters before we relax mask use, right?
      - SignalNotSecure 5y ago
        You don't need to wear a mask if you're fully vaccinated because the vaccine is over 90% effective at preventing infection https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.01.21257987v2 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.01.21257987v...
- werber 5y ago
  I live in Detroit and was just in La and the difference was insane despite Detroit being roughly 30% percent vaccinated, almost no one wears a mask whereas in LA everyone was everywhere I went
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- doopy1 5y ago
  I live in NYC where mask adoption was very high... it has been dropping pretty aggressively since the CDC and the state updated their guidelines.
- exabrial 5y ago
  You actually never needed to wear a mask outside. Even in Wuhan, the number of outdoor transmissions cases was next to nil, and they have a lot higher population density.
  - rualca 5y ago
    > You actually never needed to wear a mask outside. This claim is patently false. Even though outside spaces are safer than indoors, it's still possible to spread covid-19 outdoors, moreso if you do not respect social distancing. https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-55680305 https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-55680305 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/safe-activities-during-covid19/art-20489385 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/i... It seems that anti-maskers grab the claim that masks are not necessary if you're sitting quietly at a table on a plaza on a sunny day while preserving the min >2m social distancing, but completely disregard all other scenarios such as the journey to said plaza and unexpectedly finding yourself in high-risk scenarios while you move around. To put things in perspective, there are documented cases where COVID spread through person's that stopped to chat outdoors while not wearing a mask. What makes this sort of argument regarding the use of mask particularly dangerous is that it starts with a premise based on a very specific scenario combining key factors that are known to be safe (i.e., sit outside without a mask on a sunny day while preserving social distancing) but ends up trying to justify discarding each and every key safety factor (social distancing while outdoors in sunny, hot days, and even the need to wear a mask while going to a public place). Lastly, although wearing a mask is important to keep you from catching COVID (or any airborne respiratory disease) the main goal of wearing a mask is to ensure that asymptomatic people (and specially symptomatic people) don't unwittingly spread the virus.
    - prohobo 5y ago
      This claim is patently false. Even though M95 masks were found to be beneficial against respiratory viruses in a clinical environment, disposable or cloth masks haven't - and currently real-world testing of mask efficacy is nearly impossible due to all the other measures that go along with mask mandates. https://www.rcreader.com/commentary/masks-dont-work-covid-a-review-of-science-relevant-to-covide-19-social-policy https://www.rcreader.com/commentary/masks-dont-work-covid-a-... https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/epidemiology-and-infection/article/face-masks-to-prevent-transmission-of-influenza-virus-a-systematic-%20review/64D368496EBDE0AFCC6639CCC9D8BC05 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/epidemiology-and-inf... https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/65/11/1934/4068747 https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/65/11/1934/4068747 It seems that pro-maskers vastly overestimate the efficacy of mask wearing, especially of the kinds of masks most commonly worn in public. This over-exaggerated focus on mask wearing disregards all the other factors that contribute to lowering risk in all scenarios. To put things in perspective, there are documented cases of people going blind from COVID while indoors. This is a bullshit point, and has no statistical bearing, but it's true. What makes this sort of argument regarding the use of masks particularly dangerous is that it is only about 50% true, but treated as if it were gospel and everyone who doubts the policies is branded as dangerous by the people in power. Lastly, although wearing a mask is not likely very important (though likely somewhat beneficial!) to keep you from catching COVID (or any airborne respiratory disease) the main goal of wearing a mask is to enforce conformity through social cues, thereby treating people like cattle and not allowing any reasonable discussion or nuanced approaches to better solve problems during the pandemic.
redis_mlc 5y ago
As I wrote on HN early 2020, Wuhan and Shanghai had direct flights to SFO and LAX of 50,000 passengers per week. No doubt corona was in SF very early, possibly late 2019. SF got herd immunity from infections, which is why it was rare that we came anywhere close to ICU capacity. I watched the graphs daily for months, and while the rest of the country was losing their minds, we just didn't see much of a dent, typically in the range of 10% of total beds. The only hysteria was from Newsom, who has ambitions of running for President.
refurb 5y ago
What percentage of the population do you need to vaccinate against Covid to reach herd immunity? People who are fully vaccinated are testing positive for infection and presumably can transmit the disease (although at a much reduced rate). And it looks like ~10% of SF is under 12, so unvaccinated plus another 20% of those over 12, so maybe 20-25% of all people are unvaccinated. Is that still herd immunity?
- syspec 5y ago
  It's about 65%
call_me_dana 5y ago
Herd immunity is impossible via vaccination for SAR-CoV-2. gasp “why would you say that, heretic?” Well that’s because the vaccine doesn’t prevent transmission. I found this in a medical textbook the other day. See bolded: https://ibb.co/WcNk4Wc https://ibb.co/WcNk4Wc They may decrease transmission but get out of here with this “herd immunity” talk for these vaccines. Natural infection is another story. Source: Medical Microbiology and Immunology Thirteeth Edition by Warren Levinston

60 points by drx 5y ago

Great! Hope the rest of the US and World catches up soon.

The interesting thing about San Francisco now is that people still wear their masks outdoors despite all the excellent news and the number of new cases going down. Not that that's a bad thing. It'll be interesting to see what happens on June 15 when the mask mandate goes away in CA (theoretically).

gopalv 5y ago
> people still wear their masks outdoors despite all the excellent news The whole spring pollen thing hasn't hit me in any way this year - the cottonwood seeds are also in the air. I notice that I don't feel as bad about all of that with an N95 this year, though I'm conserving some N95s for the eventual fire season this year.
thrav 5y ago
I’m sure there will still be a good number of people wearing them places like stores for a while, since we get so many tourists. I’d bet people continue to think, “why not?”, while it’s still spreading. Most people spend 99% of their time with friends, family, or trusted coworkers anyway.
pmoriarty 5y ago
"The interesting thing about San Francisco now is that people still wear their masks outdoors" This probably depends a lot on the neighborhood. I'd be curious to know what percentage of people in poor neighborhoods like the Tenderloin and in homeless encampments (who are some of the most vulnerable) are wearing masks.
annoyingnoob 5y ago
I believe that Cal/OSHA will still require masks indoors unless everyone inside is vaccinated. Edit: "Indoors, fully vaccinated workers without COVID-19 symptoms do not need to wear face coverings in a room where everyone else is fully vaccinated and not showing symptoms. However, where there is a mixture of vaccinated and unvaccinated persons in a room, all workers will continue to be required to wear a face covering." https://www.dir.ca.gov/DIRNews/2021/2021-58.html https://www.dir.ca.gov/DIRNews/2021/2021-58.html
throwkeep 5y ago
That's bizarre because we've known for a long time now that Covid doesn't really spread outside. Doubly bizarre if vaccinated.
- annoyingnoob 5y ago
  I think its social pressure. Prior to covid we always called masks PPE or Personal Protective Equipment, and you wore PPE mostly to protect yourself. When covid hit we told everyone to wear PPE but that you were doing so to protect everyone else and not yourself - that you needed to rely on everyone else wearing masks to protect yourself. So we end up with social pressure to wear masks and you wear one to show that you are doing the right thing.
newacct583 5y ago
The new cases going down are at least partially because of continued mitigation work. I genuinely don't understand the anti-mask mania, I really don't. Mask use is almost free. Virtually no activities are precluded by wearing a mask (even eating, frankly, just lift it up and put it back to chew). Masks should be the first mitigation rule enforced in a respiratory disease environment and the last one relaxed. Restaurant and event closures, quarantines, travel restrictions, testing requirements, vaccine registries... All of those have significant real costs and should be done only when masks aren't sufficient. And they should all be relaxed first before we give up masks. But yet, everyone points to masks as somehow the opposite: in the minds of so many people (even seemingly scientifically literate people here) they're the worst thing imaginable, and... why? They're just masks. Wear 'em. It's cheap and easy.
- hamandcheese 5y ago
  They are annoying to wear. They make my beard itch. They make my glasses fog up. They make me feel overheated if it's warm out. My airflow feels noticeably restricted if I am exercising, even with ordinary non-N95 masks. They are easy to lose track of, which is highly annoying when I am otherwise ready to leave my apartment. Masks fucking suck.
  - newacct583 5y ago
    Whole careers are spent wearing masks, though. I mean, fine. I find them mildly annoying and you think they're the devil's work. But we both agree that we should be opening restaurants and theaters before we relax mask use, right?
    - SignalNotSecure 5y ago
      You don't need to wear a mask if you're fully vaccinated because the vaccine is over 90% effective at preventing infection https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.01.21257987v2 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.01.21257987v...
werber 5y ago
I live in Detroit and was just in La and the difference was insane despite Detroit being roughly 30% percent vaccinated, almost no one wears a mask whereas in LA everyone was everywhere I went
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
doopy1 5y ago
I live in NYC where mask adoption was very high... it has been dropping pretty aggressively since the CDC and the state updated their guidelines.
exabrial 5y ago
You actually never needed to wear a mask outside. Even in Wuhan, the number of outdoor transmissions cases was next to nil, and they have a lot higher population density.
- rualca 5y ago
  > You actually never needed to wear a mask outside. This claim is patently false. Even though outside spaces are safer than indoors, it's still possible to spread covid-19 outdoors, moreso if you do not respect social distancing. https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-55680305 https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-55680305 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/safe-activities-during-covid19/art-20489385 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/i... It seems that anti-maskers grab the claim that masks are not necessary if you're sitting quietly at a table on a plaza on a sunny day while preserving the min >2m social distancing, but completely disregard all other scenarios such as the journey to said plaza and unexpectedly finding yourself in high-risk scenarios while you move around. To put things in perspective, there are documented cases where COVID spread through person's that stopped to chat outdoors while not wearing a mask. What makes this sort of argument regarding the use of mask particularly dangerous is that it starts with a premise based on a very specific scenario combining key factors that are known to be safe (i.e., sit outside without a mask on a sunny day while preserving social distancing) but ends up trying to justify discarding each and every key safety factor (social distancing while outdoors in sunny, hot days, and even the need to wear a mask while going to a public place). Lastly, although wearing a mask is important to keep you from catching COVID (or any airborne respiratory disease) the main goal of wearing a mask is to ensure that asymptomatic people (and specially symptomatic people) don't unwittingly spread the virus.
  - prohobo 5y ago
    This claim is patently false. Even though M95 masks were found to be beneficial against respiratory viruses in a clinical environment, disposable or cloth masks haven't - and currently real-world testing of mask efficacy is nearly impossible due to all the other measures that go along with mask mandates. https://www.rcreader.com/commentary/masks-dont-work-covid-a-review-of-science-relevant-to-covide-19-social-policy https://www.rcreader.com/commentary/masks-dont-work-covid-a-... https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/epidemiology-and-infection/article/face-masks-to-prevent-transmission-of-influenza-virus-a-systematic-%20review/64D368496EBDE0AFCC6639CCC9D8BC05 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/epidemiology-and-inf... https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/65/11/1934/4068747 https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/65/11/1934/4068747 It seems that pro-maskers vastly overestimate the efficacy of mask wearing, especially of the kinds of masks most commonly worn in public. This over-exaggerated focus on mask wearing disregards all the other factors that contribute to lowering risk in all scenarios. To put things in perspective, there are documented cases of people going blind from COVID while indoors. This is a bullshit point, and has no statistical bearing, but it's true. What makes this sort of argument regarding the use of masks particularly dangerous is that it is only about 50% true, but treated as if it were gospel and everyone who doubts the policies is branded as dangerous by the people in power. Lastly, although wearing a mask is not likely very important (though likely somewhat beneficial!) to keep you from catching COVID (or any airborne respiratory disease) the main goal of wearing a mask is to enforce conformity through social cues, thereby treating people like cattle and not allowing any reasonable discussion or nuanced approaches to better solve problems during the pandemic.

redis_mlc 5y ago

As I wrote on HN early 2020, Wuhan and Shanghai had direct flights to SFO and LAX of 50,000 passengers per week. No doubt corona was in SF very early, possibly late 2019. SF got herd immunity from infections, which is why it was rare that we came anywhere close to ICU capacity. I watched the graphs daily for months, and while the rest of the country was losing their minds, we just didn't see much of a dent, typically in the range of 10% of total beds. The only hysteria was from Newsom, who has ambitions of running for President.

refurb 5y ago

What percentage of the population do you need to vaccinate against Covid to reach herd immunity? People who are fully vaccinated are testing positive for infection and presumably can transmit the disease (although at a much reduced rate). And it looks like ~10% of SF is under 12, so unvaccinated plus another 20% of those over 12, so maybe 20-25% of all people are unvaccinated. Is that still herd immunity?

syspec 5y ago
It's about 65%

call_me_dana 5y ago

Herd immunity is impossible via vaccination for SAR-CoV-2. gasp “why would you say that, heretic?” Well that’s because the vaccine doesn’t prevent transmission. I found this in a medical textbook the other day. See bolded: https://ibb.co/WcNk4Wc https://ibb.co/WcNk4Wc They may decrease transmission but get out of here with this “herd immunity” talk for these vaccines. Natural infection is another story. Source: Medical Microbiology and Immunology Thirteeth Edition by Warren Levinston