First, the Americans put Dolly Parton singing vaccines to the sound of “Jolene” to encourage them to receive the jab (“I’m begging you, please don’t hesitate / because once you’re dead, this is a little too late “). Now they have one more incentive. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said this week that fully vaccinated adults could meet or people at low risk of contracting Covid-19 indoors, without social distance or masks. If Americans needed more momentum, they could look to Israel, whose population is celebrating after the super-rapid launch of the vaccine has led to the suspension or disregard of most restrictions.
For citizens trapped elsewhere, the US and Israeli measures offer attractive glimpses of a post-vaccination world. Still, US guidelines, in particular, have surprised others elsewhere. In the United Kingdom, which vaccinated a greater proportion of adults than in the United States, the distancing rules remain in force for everyone. The chief physician of England warned this week that the virus could increase again in the fall, long after the inoculations are supposed to have ended.
The CDC argued that it was important to explain how life could begin to return to normal. The benefits of reducing social isolation for vaccinees outweigh the risks, he said, and can “help to improve. . . acceptance and absorption of the vaccine ”among the hesitant. Social detachment and wearing masks also met with more resistance in the United States than anywhere else; With infections still on the rise, the governors of Texas and Mississippi have lifted statewide mask requirements for everyone – what President Joe Biden called “Neanderthal thinking”.
In Israel, 4 million of its nearly 7 million adults are fully vaccinated, with a further 1 million awaiting their second injection. The rest are considered unlikely to receive the jab, due to skepticism or lack of perceived need. The government’s laissez-faire approach to enforcing the remaining restrictions may partly reflect the fact that it faces another election on March 23, the fourth in two years. But while considering how to persuade skeptics to receive jabs, the government appears to be following a tacit policy of monitoring hospital admissions and, at the same time, allowing the virus to circulate among unvaccinated youth.
Other governments may, over time, opt for a similar approach. One reason for maintaining measures such as wearing a mask, even with vaccinations well underway, has been uncertainty about whether jabs prevent transmission and also infection. The evidence that it is is growing slowly. The Israeli Ministry of Health found that vaccines were 94% effective in preventing symptomatic infections and 89% against infections of any kind, including those without symptoms. If little or no virus can be detected, many scientists assume that it cannot be transmitted.
The major threat to the “dream” scenario for governments to be able to ease restrictions almost entirely as inoculation programs end is the emergence of new variants that resist existing vaccines or cause worse symptoms and longer hospitalizations, even among young and healthy. Later rounds of jabs – reinforcement shots against mutant strains – seem inevitable. Testing programs may be needed for some time to discover new variants and as an alternative to “vaccine passports” for those who cannot or choose not to be stung.
Gradually, however, the contours of post-pandemic normality are becoming discernible. Governments in the rich world that are making good progress with vaccines now need to prepare to donate their excess doses to the developing world – to ensure that they are not the only ones who can enjoy a brighter future.