Theology in the Raw - S9 Ep915: Covid, Vaccines, Herd Immunity, and the End of the Pandemic: Dr. Martin Kulldorff

Episode Date: November 1, 2021

Martin Kulldorff was born in 1962 in Lund, Sweden. He received his Ph.D. from Cornell University and is a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a biostatistician at the Brigham and Women's Hospital. He serves on scientific advisory committees to the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control.  In this podcast, we talk about the efficacy of the vaccine, the concept of herd immunity, the efficacy of natural immunity, the Great Barrington Declaration, who’s at risk of dying from Covid, and many other things related to the pandemic. Theology in the Raw Conference - Exiles in Babylon At the Theology in the Raw conference, we will be challenged to think like exiles about race, sexuality, gender, critical race theory, hell, transgender identities, climate change, creation care, American politics, and what it means to love your democratic or republican neighbor as yourself. Different views will be presented. No question is off limits. No political party will be praised. Everyone will be challenged to think. And Jesus will be upheld as supreme. Support Preston Support Preston by going to patreon.com Venmo: @Preston-Sprinkle-1 Connect with Preston Twitter | @PrestonSprinkle Instagram | @preston.sprinkle Youtube | Preston Sprinkle Check out Dr. Sprinkle’s website prestonsprinkle.com Stay Up to Date with the Podcast Twitter | @RawTheology Instagram | @TheologyintheRaw If you enjoy the podcast, be sure to leave a review.

Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. My guest today is Dr. Martin Koldorf. Dr. Koldorf was born in Sweden. He got his PhD at Cornell University. He's currently a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a biostatistician at the Brigham and Women's Hospital. He serves on the scientific advisory committees to the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control, the CDC. He specializes in the development of, well, I don't want to misquote him, but he is an expert in vaccines, basically. He's been for the last two decades, has been doing research and knows a lot about vaccines and has obviously tons of credentials. and knows a lot about vaccines and has obviously tons of credentials.

And so I heard Dr. Koldorf speak at the Q Ideas, not Q as in Anon, but the Q Ideas conference last spring. And I was just really impressed with how knowledgeable he was and how he approached obviously very controversial topics. and how he approached obviously very controversial topics. And then I more recently was hearing some stuff about the so-called, well, not so-called, it's called the Great Barrington Declaration, which it's kind of a group of scientists that have proposed a different, well, a somewhat different approach to addressing the pandemic.

It's an approach that would reflect more kind of how Sweden approached it, elevating herd immunity and targeting at-risk groups, but they're very much against just kind of comprehensive lockdown measures for various reasons, which we talk about. So very controversial. And I'm the type of guy that if somebody is saying something about somebody somewhere, I want to go to that somebody and say, hey, just tell me what you believe. What are you guys talking about? Just so I get it from the proverbial horse's mouth. And so that's what this is. I'm not a scientist and most of you aren't either. He is. And so it was really fascinating talking to Dr. Koldorf and especially some of the stuff I heard about him that doesn't at all reflect what he believes. And so that was

cleared up on this podcast. So as with anything, you guys got to do your own fact checking. You got to do your own research and listen to various voices and become as educated as you can on these things because obviously they're very sensitive and controversial. So welcome to the show for the first time, the one and only Dr. Martin Koldorf. Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology of the Raw. I'm here with Dr. Martin Koldorf. Thank you, Dr. Koldorf, forology in the Raw. I'm here with Dr. Martin Kulldorff. Thank you, Dr. Kulldorff, for being on the show.

I really appreciate it. Oh, thank you for inviting me. Great pleasure. Yeah. So as I said in the introduction, Dr. Kulldorff is one of the architects of what's called the Great Barrington Declaration. You can Google it and get information about it. But it has been, I mean, controversial in some circles. So I have a couple, I guess, well-known people here.

The director of the World Health Organization says that, total nonsense, and very dangerous, saying that it would lead to a large number of avoidable deaths. How would you respond to that? I'm not a scientist. This is not my area at all. So here I am seeing people with credentials very much disagreeing on something. So, yeah, how would you respond to those, I guess, accusations or maybe descriptions of the project? So let me first explain very briefly what it's all about.

So there's one thing we've known about this pandemic from the early on is that while anybody can get infected, the risk of dying or mortality varies greatly by age. So older people have more than a thousand-fold larger risk of dying from COVID than the younger people. So that's an enormous difference by age. So what we proposed in the Great Banking Declaration is focused protection. So it means that these general lockdowns did not protect older vulnerable people. We know that now lots of them died.

So there was a belief, including by Fauci, that by locking down the society as a whole, we will protect these older vulnerable people. And we now know that didn't happen. We have, I think, it's over 700,000 deaths in the US and similar in other lockdown countries. So obviously we know that didn't work. So what we proposed in the Great Britain Declaration a year ago

is that we had to do a better job protecting older people. And we had several very concrete proposals, for example, in nursing homes. You should use people who have natural immunity because the residents in nursing homes, they get infected by the younger staff and the younger staff won't get very ill maybe but they can infect those older very vulnerable frail residents so by using staff that have natural immunity from having all that have covid they they won't transmit it to the same extent and very little so that was one one one suggestion and then to to reduce staff rotation in nursing homes so that each person doesn't meet too many people, because the fewer people you have to deal with, the less risk you get infected if you're old and frail.

We had other suggestions that instead of closing schools, which is detrimental to children, we should just let teachers above 60 work from home and the rest can go to school. And we know from, for example, from very early on from Sweden, in the first wave of the spring of 2020, there were 1.8 million children ages 1 to 5 who were in daycare and school normally throughout this wave first wave there were no masks no testing no social distancing if a child was sick they were sent home and among 1.8 billion children do you know how many of those died in covid zero and there were a handful of hospitalizations. And the teachers were at lower risk from COVID than the average of other professions.

So there was absolutely no reason to close schools. So what we did with this, we didn't protect the older vulnerable people well enough. At the same time, we closed schools. It had no effect on the pandemic while it had enormously collateral damage on children, both their education,

their social development and also their physical health. It's not good to sit home all day. So to me, this focus protection is a no-brainer and it actually is nothing new and novel with it. It's what was in the majority this focus protection is a no-brainer. And it actually is nothing new and novel with it.

It's what was in the majority of the pandemic preparedness plans that different countries have prepared several years ago, sort of thinking through what to do in a pandemic. So it's all consistent with that. So when Anthony Fauci sort of criticized it, he is basically mischaracterizing it. And I think it's sort of a defensive mechanism because what he proposed, I mean, he is the architect here in the U.S. And what he proposed didn't work. And he doesn't have any good arguments against focus protection because why wouldn't you protect all the people better? against focus protection because why wouldn't you protect all the people better?

Why wouldn't you let kids go to school so that they don't take the brunt of the burden for no good reason? So he didn't have any good arguments and therefore he started to mischaracterize it. And there was also a lot of slander and those kind of things for this. So I guess that's what you have to deal with sometimes.

Yeah, yeah. Has anything in what you said, or with the Great Barrington Declaration from the beginning, has anything changed since the Delta variant? Does that change anything? I don't think the Delta variant has changed a lot. I think it's probably a bit more transmissible, but it hasn't really changed the ultimate equations

or the fundamental principles of taking care of it. What has changed a lot is, since we wrote the declaration, is the vaccines came. And, of course, the vaccines are an excellent tool for protecting all the high-risk people. And most are now vaccinated, which is great. Some have already had COVID, so they don't need the vaccine. But there are still people who have not had COVID

and they're not vaccinated. And the top priority for public health right now in the U.S. should be to make sure that as many of them as possible gets vaccinated, really encourage them and help them and reach out to them to get vaccinated. But instead, we are obsessed about trying to fire nurses from hospitals who have had COVID, and therefore they don't need the vaccine. And they know they don't need it because they have superior immunity.

You have better immunity from having recovered from COVID than you have from the vaccine. So the nurses know they don't need it, but the hospitals are firing them. So we're sort of obsessed with trying to vaccinate people who have had COVID and don't need it. We're obsessed about trying to vaccinate children who are at extremely low risk, and we don't even know if the benefit outweighs the small risks with the vaccines.

Instead, we should focus on vaccinating those older people who have not yet been vaccinated and have COVID, both in the U.S. as well as in other parts of the world, of course. have COVID, both in the U.S. as well as in other parts of the world, of course. So, you know, I mean, just to be clear, I didn't, I mean, when I read the Barrington Declaration, it was before the vaccine. You don't have any vaccine hesitancy then? Because I heard somebody say, oh, yeah, they're an anti-vaxxer kind of movement. I said, I don't see that anywhere. So I just want to get clarity from you.

There's very pro-vaccine or more targeted vaccine or just people that haven't had COVID need to be vaccinated and those who maybe have had it don't need it, I heard you say? Well, I've been working on vaccines for a couple of decades, so it's hard to find somebody who's more pro-vaccine than I am. I think vaccines is one of the greatest inventions of mankind together with the wheel and the plow and the writing. So, I mean, the vaccines have saved millions and millions of lives. It's a fantastic thing. But you have to also say who do you need to vaccinate

and who you don't need to vaccinate. We don't vaccinate everybody for every disease. We have targeted vaccines. For example, we don't give the measles vaccines to somebody who is three months old. We give them later on. So we don't give measles vaccine to somebody who had measles already. So it should be the same with the COVID vaccines.

If you had COVID, you already have, there was a study from Israel comparing immunity from having had COVID versus the vaccine. And those who were vaccinated, they had 27 times higher risk of symptomatic COVID disease than those who had recovered from COVID. So the protection from having had it naturally is a lot better than vaccines. What the vaccines are great at is to reduce severe disease and death.

So the efficacy of the vaccines are in the 90s. So let's say, suppose it's 95%. It varies a little bit with vaccines, we don't know the exact number, but suppose it's 95%, that means that instead of 100 people dying, we now only have five people dying. So it doesn't prevent you from dying completely, but it greatly reduces the risk of dying. but it greatly reduces the risk of dying. On the other hand, we also know now from studies that protection against getting disease and being symptomatic, that wanes rather quickly after a few months.

So even if you're vaccinated, you will sooner or later get COVID, and you're going to feel probably, you might be asymptomatic or you might feel miserable for a few days. But with the vaccine, you're much less likely to die. And I think that's the most important. Yeah, I sure think so. So I recently heard a guy on the Joe Rogan podcast, which is like the most popular podcast. So probably six, seven, eight million people listen to this episode. He's a journalist.

He's not a medical professional, but he seems to be very well read. And he was saying that the efficacy of the vaccine wears off really quickly. I don't want to misquote him. A month or two months, and then after that, you're going to need another booster. I think he might have said, again, I would encourage people to go fact-check me and listen to what he said, that if you get vaccinated, then several months later, you think you're good to go. Your base is, you need to keep getting boosters.

And then that raises whole other questions of whether that's realistic. Is that true? Does the efficacy of the vaccine wear off after a couple of months? So it's both true and false. So the question is, what type of efficacy? The question is, what type of efficacy? So if we look at the efficacy against dying or against having severe disease or being hospitalized for COVID, that stays. That doesn't win off efficacy.

So we know that that is still in the 90s after half a year. So even after half a year after getting the vaccine, that efficacy is still in the 90s. It's still very high and very good. Now, what is it after one year? Well, we don't know because nobody had the vaccine, very few people have had it for a year, only those in the clinical trials. How much is after two years? We don't know. So it's early to tell that, but since it's very strong and robust for at least six months, it's not just going to sort of drop dead at eight and a half months. So sure, it provides protection for longer than six months, but we don't know exactly if it stays in the 90-95% for five years or if it starts to wane after a year or two.

That we don't know yet. So we have to wait and see. On the other hand, he is right in the sense that if you have efficacy in terms of catching COVID and getting sick and feeling under the weather for a couple of days, that protection wanes within a few months. Contracting COVID.

So it's more just the effects and obviously death. Okay, that makes sense. You mentioned a couple of times, I think, that if you've had COVID, you have natural immunity. And can you maybe unpack that a little bit with some specifics? You mentioned, you know, in the Israel study. So I've heard different sides of this, and I'd love to get clarity on it. Like, so you're saying natural immunity is stronger than or just as strong as getting vaccinated. And if you've had COVID, does getting the vaccine help even more or does it not do much of anything? And then also,

sorry, three questions wrapped into one. Again, does the Delta variant change anything with that? Because I've also heard, I've heard a lot of stuff. I don't have anything in front of me. I'm just, that's why I brought it. That's why I brought you on to take care of all the actual data for me. I heard somewhere that Delta last question. I heard somewhere that the Delta variant is now completely different, that if you got COVID with, I don't know, the original COVID or whatever, it doesn't protect you against Delta.

So we start with the last question. The Delta, you're still protected against the Delta variant. All the data I've seen, I've seen no data that indicates that you will not be. There could be slightly differences, but the data that has come out so far doesn't show any problems with that that we have to be concerned about. The two other questions are, I think, important. So if you look first, compare if you've had COVID,

natural immunity versus vaccine-induced immunity. So the ISRO study, I would say, is the best study on that so far, but other studies sort of confirm it. So then it depends on the... So if we compare testing positive, whether you're sick or not, you can be asymptotic and test positive. There was, I think,

something around nine-fold difference at the point estimate. And that's not surprising because if you've had COVID, eventually antibodies sort of goes down because you can't have antibodies flowing around in your blood for a hundred different diseases that you have experienced during your lifetime. So they have to sort of go down, but then,

then if you get exposed again, it takes time for the antibodies to sort of go into action. So you are prevented from getting sick, but you might still test positive because the virus is in your body. So to me, looking at preventing positive tests is not so interesting. The more interesting it is preventing symptomatic COVID disease and even more so hospitalizations and deaths. So for the symptomatic COVID disease, the Israel study shows that vaccinated people are 27 times more likely to come out with symptomatic COVID disease compared to those who have national immunity. For hospitalizations, the point estimate was less, but there were fewer hospitalizations.

So there was a lot of uncertainty around it. So we know that natural immunity is also better for hospitalization, but it's hard to pinpoint sort of a specific number of how much better it is. And then we look at deaths. In the Israel study, there were no deaths in neither group. So whether you had natural immunity or vaccine immunity, the number of deaths was zero. So both natural immunity and the vaccines worked quite well for preventing death. So it's not, is it, are you more immune

if you have natural immunity and the vaccine? Like if somebody had covid say a year ago would you say i mean i'm sure you don't want to go you know go see your doctor and listen to your doctor whatever but i mean in in your professional opinion is getting the vaccine even better or would you say it's not necessary here so in the israel study they looked at that also they compared people everybody they compared two groups. In one group, they had COVID and then they had a vaccine. In the other group, they had COVID but not the subsequent vaccine.

So when you looked at getting infections, like testing positive, then getting this sort of a booster with the vaccine reduced the chance of testing positive. And that's expected because as you get the booster, then you sort of activate the antibodies again in the immune system. And then they are more readily available so that you will sort of fight it off before there's enough virus to test positive. On the other hand, when they looked at symptomatic disease, there was no statistically significant difference. Now, that doesn't mean that there could be some because maybe there is a slight improvement. But also in both groups, they were actually, both groups were super well protected.

So you're basically comparing an epsilon risk with an epsilon half risk or something like that. So two very, very small risks. So if you have COVID, you don't need the vaccine. And it's better that you let other people use that vaccines who do need it whether this 78 year old lady in New Hampshire hasn't been going to get or if it's 83 old man in in India who needs it it's better better to use it where it will make a difference. In America, there's plenty to go around, right?

You're thinking more globally that if Americans that actually don't need the vaccine, they're in a sense taking it away from somebody in another country that might need it more? Yeah, so in the US, everybody who wants it can get it. But there are still people who haven't gotten it and who need to, older people who haven't gotten it

who need it and we need to encourage them. So that's where our public health efforts should be, not vaccinated people who don't need it. But you're right, while there's no shortage at this point in the U.S., there is a worldwide shortage still. So there are many countries where they don't have enough vaccines. And I'm sorry to tell you, but I think that the big pharmaceutical companies are probably going to sell it to, if they can sell it in the US, they get a better price.

And they're going to sell it here, even when it's more needed somewhere else. So they're, to sell it here even when it's needed somewhere else. Oh, wow. Yeah. That's a little sad, but it's not surprising. Why is there vaccine hesitancy? Is there any reason why somebody, assuming they, let's just say they haven't had COVID, is there any credibility to any of more of the, and I hesitate saying anti-vaxxer because there are some anti-vaxxers that are against all vaccines at all time for whatever reason. But then there's some people that are hesitant with this vaccine. Is there any some people that are hesitant with this vaccine. Is there any

credibility to that? I mean, why would somebody who maybe should have the vaccine, what's the reason for not getting it? Is there any legitimacy to that fear? Hey, friends, I want to invite you to consider attending the first ever Theology in the Raw Exiles in Babylon Conference, March 31st through April 2nd in Boise, Idaho. That's 2022. We have loads of awesome speakers, including Jackie Hill Perry, David Platt, David Iannubuole, Dr. Derwin Gray, Ellie Bonilla, Ed Uzinski, John Tyson, Evan Wickham, Sandy Richter, Kimika Titi, Heather Skriba, Street Hems. The list goes on. We're going to be talking about sexuality, gender, politics, race, all the stuff that everybody's

thinking about and wrestling with, but many churches are kind of a little nervous to talk about. So come join us either in person in Boise, or you can attend online. All the information is on my website, PrestonSprinkle.com. We'll see you then. Hey friends, if you've been blessed, challenged, encouraged, or angered by this podcast, would you consider supporting it through patreon.com? That's patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw. All the info is in the show notes. You can support the show for as little as five bucks a month and get access to Q&A podcasts,

monthly Patreon-only blogs, and basically just get access to the community and help support this ministry that we're doing at Theology in the Raw. Again, check out the show notes and consider supporting this show. What's the reason for not getting it? Is there any legitimacy to that fear? So the way I view this vaccine is that if you are 80 years old and you get COVID, you are at high risk of dying. It's a few percentage. Maybe you have a 5% or 2% risk of dying, and that's sort of unnecessary to take such a risk.

So the vaccine will greatly reduce that risk. So even if there is some unknown adverse reaction, which is very, very small, because we know that there's no serious adverse reactions that are very common. We know that. But the rare ones take time to figure out. But even if there are some such small risks

for the older people, I think it's a no-brainer. These older people should get it because the benefit clearly outweighs the risk. Now, if you look at a 10-year-old child, for example, their risk of dying from COVID if they get sick is minuscule. It's less

than for the annual influenza. So there is not a lot clear whether the benefits outweigh the risk. We know there are adverse reactions like myocarditis, for example, from the Pfizer-Moderna vaccine. So there it's still a question mark.

And I think as scientists, we have to be honest about those things. So then the question comes, why is the vaccine hesitancy? And I think, I mean, there are these anti-vaxxers who have been very vocal for several decades, but they have never been able to make a dent into the vaccine hesitancy in this country. This is a very small group. It's our state, very small group. So I think the main culprits of the vaccine hesitancy

are the public health officials who are pushing vaccines on people who don't need it. So when CDC or Anthony Fauci are saying that you should get vaccinated even if you have superior immunity, people understand that that's nonsense. And it is nonsense.

So what happens then is if they're saying that nonsense about people who already have immunity, why would anybody then trust CDC when they say something else? So I think not being honest with the public really destroys the trust in public health officials.

And then they're not going to trust anything they say. And that creates vaccine hesitancy. So I think Anthony Fauci and the CDC are main culprits of creating the vaccine hesitancy we are seeing in the U.S. right now. And when it comes to all the people who really need this vaccine, that hesitance is actually leading to people dying where they shouldn't have to die. So you say it's the misinformation that more and more people are aware of that's causing them to just say, I give up.

I'm not going to believe anything this guy's saying or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. There was one other episode in the spring where CDC sort of temporarily removed the Johnson & Johnson vaccine from the market. Right, yeah. There were some cases of blood clots in younger women. And they decided to take a pause of the vaccine because of these blood clots. And the vaccine uptake never survived after that.

So the trust in vaccine went down. And I, at the time, I served on the CDC working group for vaccine safety, and I was arguing that there was a case to make a pause on younger women or younger people, but there was no adverse reactions among those over 50, and those are the ones who really need this vaccine. This Johnson & Johnson vaccine is only one shot, so it's very important for reaching hard-to-reach populations, like homeless people or people living in rural areas where it's hard to get to the doctor. So it's a very important vaccine to reach hard-to-reach groups. And by putting a pause on it and temporarily withdrawing it from the market, CDC, I think, messed up gravely, and the people who needed this vaccine didn't get it,

and then the confidence also plummeted. But because I voiced opposing views to CDC, they removed me from that committee. Oh, really? They didn't want me there. So I'm probably the only person who has ever been removed from the CDC committee because I'm too pro-vaccine. That's my guess. I think the numbers were something like there was like six million people that had the Johnson and

Johnson and there were six people with that had blood clots so basically one let me literally one in a million is that accurate? Is that statistic? I'm not sure of the exact numbers, but it was very small risk. But it was also very age-specific. So all the blood clots was in people below 50.

I think there was one or two in men, but most of them were in women. So there was nothing in people over 50. So we knew at that time that this was in terms of blood class it was perfectly safe for older people. And they were the ones who needed it the most because they are the ones who have high risk of COVID. So I think it was not good that decision to pass the vaccine for those over 50. Okay.

What about, I've also heard that, and I'm going to mispronounce this, but is it, I want to say mitochondria or some kind of heart condition that young, healthy males are getting from the vaccine? I mean, getting, I say, you know, a few have gotten it, at least enough that has raised some concern. Is that, is that, what's the name of that? It's myocarditis. Myocarditis. So it's inflammation of the heart. So is that true? What's, what's going on there with, I think it was young teenage boys or younger men? Yeah, so that's, we didn't know that

when the vaccines were approved, but that's one of the adverse reactions we have found out since. So, and that's for the Pfizer-Moderna vaccines. Is it a high percentage that are getting that? Or, I mean...

No, I think it's one in 5,000 or one in 10,000. So, it's a very rare disease, very rare reactions. But that's predominantly in younger people, mostly more men than women. So it's highest in teenage boys and men in their 20s, maybe up in their 30s. But again, it hasn't been found to be a risk in older people,

at least not yet. Would that be a cause for hesitancy for a young, healthy teenage boy of getting it? for hesitancy for a teenage, a young, healthy teenage boy of getting it? Or I guess you have to weigh out how at risk is this person from COVID

and how at risk is he with the vaccine? Yeah, so if you are a 15-year-old boy or a 25-year-old young man, your risk from dying from COVID is minuscule. It's very, very small.

So it's not at all clear that they would benefit from the vaccine. And that the benefits outweigh the risks. For a 75-year-old man, yes, for sure, absolutely, they benefit. They should absolutely get the vaccine.

Right. Okay. What about the I've heard, again, I've heard, I can't cite any actual study here, but that the only thing that will prevent variants

like constant mutations is if everybody got vaccinated. So as long as people aren't vaccinated, variants, like constant mutations, is if everybody got vaccinated. So as long as people aren't vaccinated, they may have some kind of natural immunity, but they can still host the vaccine, cause variants to keep spreading.

So until almost everybody is vaccinated, other variants are going to keep being developed, some that might even be more deadly than some of the ones we've seen. Is there legitimacy to that? So all viruses mutate. So the fact that COVID is mutating or the SARS-CoV-2 is mutating is expected. So that's not strange.

or the SARS-CoV-2 is mutating is expected. So that's not strange. When there's mutations, if there's a mutation that makes it more transmissible, that mutation will have an advantage. So that might sort of take over, competing out other variants. But to blame it on those who are not vaccinated, that's not right. First of all, those who have had COVID spread it much less. So we know that even if you're vaccinated,

you can still be sick and you can transmit it to others. So to sort of blame it on you can transmit it to others. So to sort of blame it on transmissions on those who are not vaccinated but have already natural immunity is complete nonsense from a scientific point of view. So that's just a political stunt. That's something bloody wrong. Now, what effect does vaccinations have on mutation rates?

That's the good question. What effect does the lockdowns have on mutation rates, that's a good question. What effect does the lockdowns have on mutation rates or new variants? That's also a good question. It's a difficult thing to know for sure, so it's maybe better not to speculate. So it's maybe better not to speculate, but both vaccines and lockdowns could potentially generate new variants that sort of escape the vaccine or escape the lockdowns that are more transmissible because of those things. But whether that has happened or not, I don't know. So it's a theoretical thing that could happen.

But I don't know if it actually did happen. So, I mean, in your view, as you kind of look ahead the next year or two, is it likely or logical that between people getting COVID, getting natural immunity, people getting vaccinated, that this thing will eventually die off? Is that too simplistic? Or do we just not know? Because it's only a matter of time until everybody's either had the vaccine or had COVID. There are breakthrough cases, but those are still a lot less than... If somebody's been vaccinated, it seems like they could break through, but it's obviously minimized that they would get it again. Yes, I think it will die off. All pandemics end. This pandemic will end.

die off, all pandemics end, this pandemic will end, the virus will not disappear, so we will move from the pandemic stage when we have these waves of a lot of people getting sick and dying, until we get to an endemic state where we will sort of live with the virus and what happens and I mean there were and we reached that endemic stage when we reached herd immunity, when enough people have immunity. Now, when the vaccines came out, we were hoping that the vaccines would help with that. But that's not going to be the case because while it protects well against the death, the protection against infection and transmission wanes off very quickly in a few months.

So we're not going to reach pandemic states. Everybody's going to get, almost everybody's going to get COVID disease. Some will be asymptomatic. Some will have symptoms. But whether you're vaccinated or not, everybody's going to get it and it's when you get it it's better to have had the vaccine when you get it the first time

but what's going to happen is that these waves are going to end at some point and but they will still circulate and then you're going to be exposed and as you're exposed you might be either asymptomatic or you might have a mild cold or something, a mild disease. But every time you're exposed, the immune system sort of gets nauseous there, so you sort of boost the immune system a little bit. And that's how we're going to live with it,

just like we do with the previous four coronaviruses that are circulating, have circulated for at least 100 years in society. But then you're going to have somebody who is 93 years old in a nursing home and their immune system is deteriorating and they might die from it, just like they might die from having influenza or from some other common virus, because their immune system has deteriorated and their body is no longer able to fight off these viruses.

So that's something that we've had. We've always had that these older fra, patients will often die from a virus that the rest of us will easily fight off. Right, right. When do you think, just based on the numbers, we'll reach, this sounds a little confident, but the end of the pandemic or the transition from it's a pandemic to now it's just an endemic and now we're just we have to live with this do you feel like we're close to that or are in it or is this a year or two out just based on again how many people are getting vaccinated how many people have had covid so my guess is that we in the u.s we're going to have a winter wave again but i don't know how big it's going to be. I think the mortality will be less because of the vaccines.

But the vaccine is not 100% foolproof, and some people haven't gotten the vaccine, so there will be, I guess, mortality is my guess. I don't know how big the wave will have. But it also depends on geographically because there are some areas of the US who've already had

a lot of this. So there's a lot of the US who've already had a lot of this. So there's a lot of natural immunity. But then there's other areas where they have had less. So there's less natural immunity. So they will probably be hit harder this time around. And we can also compare, for example, New Zealand and Australia, they sort of kept it out for a long time, but now it's sort of exploding there.

So they are nowhere close to the endemic states. But other countries, some parts of the U.S., I think, as well as some of the countries in Europe, are much, much closer to the endemic states. And some have already reached it, I don't know. I know Australia, they've got a lot of vaccine mandates. It seems I got a buddy who I was just talking to in Australia, and he's like, I think close to 80% of the population has been vaccinated.

As far as a country that has been vaccinated, they're among the highest, I think. Why is it exploding there? Well, the vaccine will protect against death and hospitalization and serious disease. But the protection against symptomatic disease and presumably then transmission wanes off after a number of months.

So that means that you get the vaccines that maybe sort of push the way forward in time, but eventually it's going to come back. And we're seeing increasing deaths. So deaths has an increase there it's just people getting it and that's because like as you said already

you can get it with the vaccine you're just their symptoms are going to be a lot less yeah there are some deaths in Australia also I think

and I expect to see more because the vaccine is not 100% effective but the more people who the more because the vaccine is now 100% effective. But the more people who, the more people, the older people are vaccinated, the less death they're going to have in Australia. Okay. I think the same thing in Israel, too. I mean, they're heavily vaccinated.

And we saw a big spike more recently in people that got COVID. Again, I didn't die from it. But I guess that would just prove your point that you can still very easily get it. Your symptoms are going to be minimized. Yeah, another example is Iceland because it's sort of a small island country. They have among the highest vaccination rates in the world. But this summer, they still had a wave of COVID. Right, yeah. And I wouldn't be surprised if they have another one this winter.

Okay, okay. Man, I'm running out of questions. You've answered so many of the questions that I had. This has been so helpful. So, I guess you've already said it. One of my questions was the concept of herd immunity. I know that's been debated and it's been politicized. And if I remember, I mean, as you know, in the U.S., everything's so politicized.

And I remember, I think a year ago, Donald Trump seemed to talk positively about herd immunity. Trump seemed to talk positively about herd immunity, and therefore anybody who was against Trump kind of went against the concept, which to me, it's like, well, is it legit or is it not? So, I mean, you seem, you're very, that's a valid concept, this idea of herd immunity, that when a certain percentage of the population gets it, things will start to wane. of the population gets it, things will start to wane. Yeah, so it's been very weird as an epidemiologist to, frustrating to look at this debate

because herd immunity is a well-established scientific phenomenon, just like gravity. So to discuss whether herd immunity exists is like discussing whether gravity exists. So it's sort of ridiculous. so to discuss where the herd immunity exists is like discussing where the gravity exists and people are talking about herd immunity strategies but that doesn't, I mean whatever we do we will eventually reach herd immunity and when we reach herd immunity that's when it's not going to go away

but that's when we reach the endemic stage so these discussions whether to have a herd immunity study or not, it's like you have two pilots in an airplane thinking they're going to land the plane and say, well, should we use a gravity strategy when landing the plane or should we not? I mean, gravity is going to ensure that the plane comes down to the ground sooner or later. It's just a question of landing the plane in a safe manner without people dying. So it's really weird. That's all discussion about it. It's really absurd. For me, I understand that people have never heard of this before and for them it's a new

and interesting concept. But for me as an epidemiologist, it's absolutely very strange. Well, other countries have very much adopted it. Is it Sweden that from the very beginning had that kind of at the forefront of its policies? Or maybe it wasn't Sweden. Was it Sweden? Well, Sweden didn't, for example, close all the schools in the first wave. And then the rest of Europe followed during 2020-2021. We're not closing the schools.

So Sweden did much less of the lockdown measures. Right, okay. They were much less strict. They were also really good at focusing, when the vaccine came, they really focused on the oldest people to get those vaccinated first. Right.

Strict rules about the order of vaccinations to vaccinate all the people first, together with the healthcare providers and nursing home staff. So they did a good job with that. They didn't do a good job in the beginning of the pandemic of protecting the nursing homes especially in stockholm area but so so yeah they took a much lighter touch when it comes to general lockdowns and didn't close schools uh for ages 1 to 15 and And they now have better results

than many of the harsh lockdown countries in Europe. And it wasn't just Sweden, because Denmark and Finland and Norway also had a much lighter approach when it comes to lockdowns. They did even better than Sweden in many ways. Okay, okay. One last question I forgot to ask um on the on the wikipedia page of the great

barrington declaration so this is wikipedia i don't i don't normally go here but they um they said the the the great barrington declaration was funded by the american institute for economic research a libertarian think tank and then they talked about all the Koch brothers and other people who have funded this. And somebody who is very not really into libertarian thinking pointed that out to me and said, well, this whole thing is, look where the money is. But then I read somewhere that you denied, or you said that's, I don't't know you kind of gave a different perspective on the funding of the declaration so can i get clarity on that i don't know how much it matters personally but yeah well uh if one of your listeners uh edit wikipedia pages maybe they

should go and change that because that's completely wrong. That's misinformation errors. Nobody has paid us any money for the Great Britain Declaration or the work that we do on focus protection. I have, I'm one of the few scientists who work on vaccines and drugs who has never received any funding from the pharmaceutical industry because I think that gives the conflict of interest. on vaccines and drugs who has never received any funding from the pharmaceutical industry. Because I think that gives the conflict of interest. So this is complete nonsense. It was signed at the American Institute of Economic Research.

We were there for other reasons to do some media interviews. Me and Dr. Jay Balacharya from Stanford and Dr. Sneta Gupta from Oxford. And while we were there, we decided to write this declaration and sign it and post it. But suppose we instead have met at Starbucks and written it there over a cup of coffee, would Wikipedia have written that it was sponsored by Starbucks? I mean, it's complete nonsense. So, yeah. I don't know what to do about it.

People can say whatever stupid things they want and it's not hard to do anything about it. Yeah. Welcome to my world. Because then they say in this group denies climate science and they kind of try to connect. They try to make it out to be that the group that funded it is this far right wing science denying whatever organization and therefore, you know, connected dots. So I don't hear you denying climate change but no and i think this aar they don't they they do uh economic research is like

a free market uh economic research institute and uh they don't deny climate change and uh i think they received uh sixty eight thousand dollars for from the coke some coke foundation to do some for some conference they organized just several years ago. But if you want to connect to me, GBD with the Koch brothers, there's much closer connection because I work for Harvard University and Harvard has received millions and millions of dollars from the Koch. Brute Brother foundations as Jay works for Stanford and they also have received millions of dollars.

So there's much more closer connection, not for any of our research, it's for other people at the universities. Right. But if you want to do, if people want to do those attacks, they could even do a lot better I think than the silly things. But there was some kind of, there was, I think, a journalist in, well, not a journalist, but some guy in the UK who, he was,

he's a conspiracy theorist denying, like, the 9-11 thing. And then, I guess, he got a new interest about the Great Barrington Declaration and was posting a lot of nonsense that then other picks up on. So, I mean, if people have their arguments,

they should discuss the content of the Grapevine evaluation. So I'm happy to discuss that with any other scientists. Yeah. Well, Dr. Kolder, I've already taken you an hour here. So thank you so much for coming on.

I know your time's very precious and valuable. I appreciate your clarity and just your, just your humility and wisdom and all these really touchy topics. So thank you so much. Really appreciate it. Well, thank you for having me. It was great pleasure talking to you.

So, okay. Take care. You too.