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This is actually not true, since enough people being unvaccinated can prevent herd immunity from protecting everyone.
Herd immunity is an indirect protection from an infectious disease that occurs when enough of a population has immunity (either from vaccination or prior infection). When enough people are immune, infections are unable to spread and outbreaks naturally end. This protects people within the population who don’t have immunity (unable to be vaccinated for medical reasons, vaccinated but didn’t get complete immunity, too young for the vaccine, immunocompromised, etc). It also protects those with some immunity who might still have a less severe infection.
The vaccination rate required for herd immunity depends on how infectious a particular disease is. Measles is particularly infectious, and a 95% vaccination rate is considered necessary for herd immunity. Many parts of the US have rates lower than that, which is why measles outbreaks are becoming common after the disease had basically been eradicated for decades.
Thanks for indulging my ignorance. However, wouldn't a 100% fully vaccinated and immunized community still be able to spread?
Say the flu shot, I'd like to say we have high rates of vaccinated people for that, however, if we walk in to a community that doesn't, won't it spread to them and kill them?
Edit: I read this article explaining more about the herd immunity you mentioned and it feels a bit missing to me
For example, if this person gets a case of the flu for example, they might still sneeze and cough, which someone will breath in if they're not wearing protective face coverings, and they will transmit it to more people until it hits a vulnerable person. These people have mild flu symptoms because they're vaccinated, but it still gets an immunocompromised person in the crossfire.
In the bbc article, it's as if it stops people from spreading the disease
https://www.bbc.com/news/57229390
It does depend on the disease and the vaccine.
Usually, yes, vaccinated people can still carry and transmit the disease. However, they're much more likely to have less severe or even no symptoms, and for many diseases they're also much less likely to transmit than an unvaccinated person.
The real answer to your question is: the more people that are vaccinated, the safer everyone is. It is the height of self-centered self-importance for anti-vaxers to consider their right to avoid minor side effects as more important than the health and safety - potentially even the life - of the immunocompromised people in their community.
I think herd immunity might work in a way by shortening the time each infected person has with infection and reducing the amount if variants, however, we need to combine this with quarantining and protective equipment to make it the most effective
Lack of herd immunity doesn't make a vaccinated person unvaccinated. It just means the pathogen has enough population left to sustain itself.
That’s correct, but I wasn’t implying the opposite; I hope my comment doesn’t read that way.
A fraction of the vaccinated population will not have 100% immunity. Even among healthy, non-immunocompromised people vaccines generally don’t have a 100% efficacy. For example, annual flu vaccines vary in efficacy, but are often around 50%.
As I said in my comment, herd immunity is a form of indirect protection. Keeping a disease from being able to spread prevents people from being exposed at all, regardless of their immunity status. If enough people are unvaccinated and there is no herd immunity, then that increases the risk for the whole population - even those who were vaccinated since generally that doesn’t guarantee immunity.
There are certainly arguments to be made about bodily autonomy and weighing individual rights against those of society. However, the idea that “the decision to not be vaccinated is an individual choice that doesn’t harm others” is incorrect, and therefore not a great argument against vaccine mandates.