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There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
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Even as health officials continue to try to calculate — and communicate — when herd immunity might happen, they have to contend with both public misunderstanding of the term and scientific disagreement over what it means. Even within public health circles, “some of our colleagues have disagreed with one another” on the definition of herd immunity, says Joshua Weitz, Patton Distinguished Professor and Co-Director of the Interdisciplinary Ph.D. in Quantitative Biosciences at the School of Biological Sciences. Changes in behavior can lead to declines in cases, he says, “that do not imply that the population has reached herd immunity.” Populations develop immunity through a combination of vaccination and natural infections, Weitz says, and the safe and ethical route to reach herd immunity is through vaccinations.
