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Amish Communities Became the First to Achieve Covid “Herd Immunity” (realclearpolitics.com)
5 points by Proven on Oct 12, 2021 | hide | past | favorite | 5 comments


There have been a few articles shared here in the last couple days about the Amish and their "herd immunity" event in May 2020 (seems like someone has an agenda). I think it is wishful thinking that they achieved it at that time (if they have at all). Tests done at the time and soon after were only returning positive results in the 60 and 70% ranges, which is less than required for herd immunity. Tellingly, they then seemed to fare no better when the biggest US wave hit: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8195242/

> Our results indicate the Amish/Mennonite excess death rates are similar to the national trends in the USA. The excess death rate for Amish/Mennonites spiked with a 125% increase in November 2020.

And this study doesn't even cover the current delta wave (stops Jan 2021).


Intriguing:

One thing’s clear: there's no evidence of any more deaths among the Amish than in places that shut down tight— some claim there were fewer here. That’s without masking, staying at home, or another important measure.

Sharyl: Did most of the community, at least the adults, get the Covid-19 vaccine?

Nolt: Again, we don't have data on that, but I think it's pretty clear that in percentage terms, relatively few did.

Lapp: Oh, we're glad all the English people got their Covid vaccines. That's great. Because now we don't have to wear a mask, we can do what we want. So good for you. Thank you. We appreciate it. Us? No, we're not getting vaccines. Of course not. We all got the Covid, so why would you get a vaccine?


This seems like exactly the sort of thing that would make a great study.


Likely Amish are not obese and death rates would be expected to be lower.


That is an interesting observation. I double checked: "One result of this is that only about 4% of Amish people are obese, compared with 36.5% of the overall U.S. population."

https://time.com/5159857/amish-people-stay-healthy-in-old-ag...




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