SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (KRON) - The Johnson and Johnson vaccine could help us get to herd immunity faster, according to medical experts.
Herd immunity is a term we have heard a lot about during this pandemic.
A new California health care poll out says a large number of people now believe in getting vaccinated.
Herd immunity or as an infectious disease expert calls it, community immunity, is the goal of this pandemic.
That would allow us to get back to living our lives so the Johnson and Johnson news is significant because as the experts remind us, the more virus out into peoples' arms the faster we can move on.
Plus, the Johnson and Johnson vaccine is uniquely suited to help accomplish that goal.
Bay Area medical experts explain that the Johnson and Johnson vaccine was created differently from Pfizer and Moderna and the difference could be quite significant in the fight against SARS-CoV-2.
D. John Swartzberg with UC Berkeley's Public School of Health and a member of the UC Berkeley UCSF joint medical program joined KRON4.
“You can use it, and then at the end of the day, if you have some leftover in the vial, you put it back in the refrigerator, and the next day you use it again. You can't do it with these more fragile vaccines, Moderna and Pfizer's vaccine,” Dr. Swartzberg, MD, FACP, said.
Unlike Pfizer and Moderna vaccines that require freezing temps, and once thawed must be used or thrown out, Johnson and Johnson can be kept in normal refrigerator and it is a one-and-done deal.
Although a notch-less efficacious or effective than the other two, he gives us this:
“The influenza vaccine, ranges from 40 to 60 percent depending on the year, in terms of efficacy and I will miss an influenza vaccine because you know, if you're going to tell me I have a 50 percent less chance of getting influenza, I'm going to go for it, and if you're going to tell me I have a 70 percent chance of not getting SARS-CoV-2 by getting the JNJ vaccine, I'm gonna go for it. Sure it would be nice to have something, 94, 95 percent but we've got to get people vaccinated quickly because that's what's going to save people's lives,” Dr. Swartzberg said.
That gets us to herd immunity or as the doctor likes to say community immunity.
While a recent California healthcare poll says 70 percent of residents say they will get the vaccine, is that enough?
The doctor says that is complicated, well, because we live in a complicated world.
“If you have, let's say the city of San Francisco, and you walled it off and didn't let anybody come in, or let anybody go out, then if you're talking herd immunity, and I much prefer the term community immunity, so if you're talking about community immunity in that walled-off San Francisco, you can talk about that, but we don't live in a world where we are walled off from other people,” Dr. Swartzberg said.
Then there is this.
“There is a debate about what will it take. On the low end, people say about 60 percent of the population being immune, and that's on the real low end and most people think it's hight than that,” Dr. Swartzberg said.
The bottom line, the goal posts keep moving so we must keep moving and striving to do all we can to outsmart the virus to end this.
Meaning getting more vaccines out, there fix the supply and administration of the vaccine, mask and social distance in the meantime.
from KRON4 https://ift.tt/36q64e8
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