DR MAXWELL ADEYEMI

The race to the reopening of the borders and the economy worldwide is hinged on achieving herd immunity through vaccination. It appears to be the best way out of the pandemic that the world has been afflicted with at the moment.

Herd immunity is an indirect protection from infectious disease that can occur with some diseases when a sufficient percentage of a population has become immune to an infection, whether through vaccination or previous infection, thereby reducing the likelihood of infection for individuals who lack immunity. Herd immunity also referred to a "community or group' protection that occurs when people in a community become immune to an infectious disease such that it stops the disease from spreading. Herd immunity can be achieved by allowing a significant number of people in the population to be infected so that they develop immunity, and this in turn protects the other people in the population. It can go into effect when about 40 per cent of the people in a population becomes immune to the disease, but in most cases 80-90 per cent of the population must be immune to the disease to stop active spread.

The goal of herd immunity is to prevent other vulnerable people from catching or spreading the infectious disease. Natural immunity occurs when you become immune to a specific disease after contracting it. This triggers the immune system to make antibiotics against the germ, so if you come in contact with the germ again, the antibodies defend your body and attack the germ before it can make you sick.

Natural immunity can help create herd immunity but it does not work as well as vaccination. In this scenario, everyone would have to contract the disease to become immune. But because covid19 can have serious health risk or lead to fatality, contracting it is not a desirable way of achieving herd immunity and it does not always guarantee protection.

You can help achieve herd immunity by making sure you are vaccinated. Vaccines train the body's immune system to create proteins that fight disease, these proteins known as antibodies are produced in the body just as would happen when we are exposed to the specific germ, but vaccines achieve this feat without making us sick.

Immunity from infections

Some people argue that if they get infected they will be immune to covid19. Unvaccinated infected people do produce antibodies, but such may be insufficient to fully protect them against future exposure. These levels and types of immune response may not be effective as it differs from person to person.

More so, if unvaccinated people gets infected, the virus can multiply and mutate, and may become deadlier by creating new variants. If the mutation changes occur into another structurally or anatomically different virus than the original virus mutation with potential, havoc may occur and present vaccines may not be effective. Hence there is a race against time to get as many people as possible vaccinated before an