WHO says COVID-19 herd immunity ‘unethical’ but also rejects lockdown

The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned countries against perusing herd immunity to stop the spread of the virus, branding the method “unethical”. 

The remarks came just days after the WHO’s special envoy for COVID-19 warned against introducing lockdowns. The radical plan of herd immunity is achieved when the vast majority of the population becomes immune to the disease and therefore can no longer spread it.

The controversial plan primary involves letting the virus rip through the population.

Tedros Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the WHO, has ruled out the strategy insisting it would have the opposite effect.

He said: “Herd immunity is achieved by protecting people from a virus, not by exposing them to it.

“Never in the history of public health has herd immunity been used as a strategy for responding to an outbreak.”

The WHO estimates around 10 percent of people have built up enough anti-bodies to tackle coronavirus.

Mr Ghebreyesus insisted diseases, such as measles, require up to 95 percent of people to be protected for herd immunity to work.

Just last week, Dr David Nabarro special WHO envoy for coronavirus, questioned the effectiveness of lockdowns.

Dr Nabarro insisted “lockdowns just freeze the virus in place, they do not lead to elimination”.

He added: “Lockdowns just have one consequence that you must never ever belittle, and that is making poor people an awful lot poorer.

“We in the World Health Organisation do not advocate lockdowns as the primary means of control of this virus.

“The only time we believe a lockdown is justified is to buy you time to reorganise, regroup, rebalance your resources, protect your health workers who are exhausted, but by and large, we’d rather not do it.”

Dr Nabarro added a lockdown can only be effective in an outbreak at local level.

He added: “From time to time it will be necessary briefly to restrict movement locally to enable suppression of outbreaks.”

-Agencies