new estimates: 76% of Americans have had covid

a new set of estimates have emerged on past covid prevalence in the US. they purport to show that ~76% of Americans have, by now, had covid.

this seems like a plausible number to me and having taken a quick look through their methods and sourcing, it seems like they took a reasonable approach, subject of course to all the limitations and estimations inherent in extrapolating a number like this (which are not insubstantial). this is a model, not a collected dataset, but it seems a fairly reasonable one.

what this shows is is a disease that’s over and going to wind down and go endemic.

how it fares in future years in terms of evading acquired immunity (it has certainly evaded vaccines already) is an open issue, but i think the odds on bet is that yes, it will be somewhat evasive, and no, that is not a threat to anyone.

it’ll be like other coronaviruses, widespread, mutating somewhat, and mild to the point of being more annoying that anything else. it’s going to become a cold.

children will get it at a time when it poses them almost no threat.

they will acquire immunity as they do to 50 other common childhood infections. they may get it again later, but it will be mild because the immunity, while not perfect, will be cross reactive.

the same will be true of the adults. i have heard of VERY few cases of SARS-CoV-2 reinfection that were in any way severe. the odds on bet is that this will persist, just as it does in the other big 4 of circulating covid colds. (read more)