John Snow Memorandum
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The Great Barrington Declaration is an
open letter An open letter is a Letter (message), letter that is intended to be read by a wide audience, or a letter intended for an individual, but that is nonetheless widely distributed intentionally. Open letters usually take the form of a letter (mess ...
published in October 2020 in response to the
COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
and
lockdowns A lockdown () is a restriction policy for people, community or a country to stay where they are, usually due to specific risks that could possibly harm the people if they move and interact freely. The term is used for a prison protocol that us ...
. It claimed that COVID-19 lockdowns could be avoided via the fringe notion of "focused protection", by which those most at risk of dying from an infection could purportedly be kept safe while society otherwise took no steps to prevent infection. The envisaged result was
herd immunity Herd immunity (also called herd effect, community immunity, population immunity, or mass immunity) is a form of indirect protection that applies only to contagious diseases. It occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population has become i ...
as
SARS-CoV-2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19, the respiratory illness responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had the Novel coronavirus, provisional nam ...
swept through the population. Signed by
Sunetra Gupta Sunetra Gupta (born 15 March 1965) is an Indian-born British infectious disease epidemiologist and a professor of theoretical epidemiology at the Department of Zoology, University of Oxford. She has performed research on the transmission dynamic ...
of the
University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...
,
Jay Bhattacharya Jayanta Bhattacharya (born 1968) is an American physician-scientist and health economist who has served as the 18th Director of the National Institutes of Health since 2025. Bhattacharya was a professor of medicine, economics, and health resear ...
of
Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...
, and
Martin Kulldorff Martin Kulldorff (born 1962) is a Swedish biostatistician. He was a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School from 2003 until his dismissal in 2024. He is a member of the US Food and Drug Administration's Drug Safety and Risk Management ...
of
Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
, it was sponsored by the
American Institute for Economic Research The American Institute for Economic Research (AIER) is a classical liberal think tank located in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1933 by Edward C. Harwood, an economist and investment advisor, and is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. ...
(AIER), a
libertarian Libertarianism (from ; or from ) is a political philosophy that holds freedom, personal sovereignty, and liberty as primary values. Many libertarians believe that the concept of freedom is in accord with the Non-Aggression Principle, according ...
free-market think tank associated with
climate change denial Climate change denial (also global warming denial) is a form of science denial characterized by rejecting, refusing to acknowledge, disputing, or fighting the scientific consensus on climate change. Those promoting denial commonly use rhetor ...
. The declaration was drafted in
Great Barrington, Massachusetts Great Barrington is a New England town, town in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 7,172 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Bot ...
, signed there on 4 October 2020, and published on 5 October. At the time,
COVID-19 vaccine A COVID19 vaccine is a vaccine intended to provide acquired immunity against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 ( COVID19). Knowledge about the structure and fun ...
s were considered to be months away from general availability. The document presumed that the
disease burden Disease burden is the impact of a health problem as measured by financial cost, mortality, morbidity, or other indicators. It is often quantified in terms of quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) or disability-adjusted life years (DALYs). Both ...
of mass infection could be tolerated, that any infection would confer long term sterilizing immunity, and it made no mention of
physical distancing Physical may refer to: *Physical examination In a physical examination, medical examination, clinical examination, or medical checkup, a medical practitioner examines a patient for any possible medical signs or symptoms of a Disease, medical co ...
,
masks A mask is an object normally worn on the face, typically for protection, disguise, performance, or entertainment, and often employed for rituals and rites. Masks have been used since antiquity for both ceremonial and practical purposes, ...
,
contact tracing In public health, contact tracing is the process of identifying people who may have been exposed to an infected person ("contacts") and subsequent collection of further data to assess transmission. By tracing the contacts of infected individua ...
, or
long COVID Long may refer to: Measurement * Long, characteristic of something of great duration * Long, characteristic of something of great length * Longitude (abbreviation: long.), a geographic coordinate * Longa (music), note value in early music mens ...
, which has left patients with debilitating symptoms months after the initial infection. The
World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations which coordinates responses to international public health issues and emergencies. It is headquartered in Gen ...
(WHO) and numerous academic and public-health bodies stated that the strategy would be dangerous and lacked a sound scientific basis. They said that it would be challenging to shield all those who are medically vulnerable, leading to a large number of avoidable deaths among both older people and younger people with pre-existing health conditions, and warned that the long-term effects of
COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. In January 2020, the disease spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic. The symptoms of COVID‑19 can vary but often include fever ...
were still not fully understood. Moreover, the WHO said that the herd immunity component of the proposed strategy is undermined by the unknown duration of post-infection immunity. They said that the more likely outcome would be recurrent epidemics, as was the case with numerous infectious diseases before the advent of
vaccination Vaccination is the administration of a vaccine to help the immune system develop immunity from a disease. Vaccines contain a microorganism or virus in a weakened, live or killed state, or proteins or toxins from the organism. In stimulating ...
. The
American Public Health Association The American Public Health Association (APHA) is a Washington, D.C.–based professional membership and advocacy organization for public health professionals in the United States. APHA is the largest professional organization of public health pr ...
and 13 other public-health groups in the United States warned in a joint open letter that the "Great Barrington Declaration is not grounded in science and is dangerous". The Great Barrington Declaration received support from the Donald Trump administration,
British Conservative The Conservative and Unionist Party, commonly the Conservative Party and colloquially known as the Tories, is one of the two main political parties in the United Kingdom, along with the Labour Party (UK), Labour Party. The party sits on the Cent ...
politicians, and from ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
''
editorial board The editorial board is a group of editors, writers, and other people who are charged with implementing a publication's approach to editorials and other opinion pieces. The editorials published normally represent the views or goals of the publicat ...
.


Background and content

The idea to issue a declaration came from a conference run by the
American Institute for Economic Research The American Institute for Economic Research (AIER) is a classical liberal think tank located in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1933 by Edward C. Harwood, an economist and investment advisor, and is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. ...
(AIER). Gupta, one of the authors, said that given journals’ reluctance to publish on herd immunity and that the authors had been "repeatedly dismissed as fringe or pseudoscience" an open letter was chosen as the publication route out of necessity. The declaration says that lockdowns have adverse effects on physical and mental health, for example, because people postpone
preventive healthcare Preventive healthcare, or prophylaxis, is the application of healthcare measures to prevent diseases.Hugh R. Leavell and E. Gurney Clark as "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life, and promoting physical and mental health a ...
. The authors propose reducing these harms by ending mandatory restrictions on most activities for most people. Without these restrictions, more people will develop COVID-19. They believe that these infections will produce
herd immunity Herd immunity (also called herd effect, community immunity, population immunity, or mass immunity) is a form of indirect protection that applies only to contagious diseases. It occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population has become i ...
(the idea that when enough people become immune, then the virus will stop circulating widely), which will eventually make it less likely that high-risk people will be exposed to the virus. The authors say that, instead of protecting everyone, the focus should instead be on "shielding" those most at risk, with few mandatory restrictions placed on the remainder of the population.
Stanford Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth governor of and th ...
epidemiologist Yvonne Maldonado said that 40% of Americans have an elevated risk of dying from COVID-19, so this would require keeping the 40% of people with known risk factors away from the 60% of people without known risk factors. In practice, such shielding is impossible to achieve. *For "unethical", ''see'' ; *for the "impossible" nature of focused protection, ''see'' ; *for "pseudoscience", ''see'' . The declaration names specific economic changes that the signatories favour: resuming "life as normal", with schools and universities open for in-person teaching and extracurricular activities, re-opening offices, restaurants, and other places of work, and resuming mass gatherings for cultural and athletic activities. By October 2020, many of these things had already happened in some parts of the world, but likewise were being restricted elsewhere; for instance the UK saw quarantines of students, travel advisories, restrictions on meeting other people, and partial closures of schools, pubs and restaurants. The declaration does not provide practical details about who should be protected or how they can be protected. For instance, it does not mention testing any people outside of nursing homes,
contact tracing In public health, contact tracing is the process of identifying people who may have been exposed to an infected person ("contacts") and subsequent collection of further data to assess transmission. By tracing the contacts of infected individua ...
, wearing masks, or
social distancing In public health, social distancing, also called physical distancing, (NB. Regula Venske is president of the PEN Centre Germany.) is a set of non-pharmaceutical interventions or measures intended to prevent the spread of a contagious dise ...
. It mentions multi-generational households but does not provide any information about how, for example, low-risk people can get infected without putting high-risk members of their household at risk of dying. The declaration does not provide any references to published data that support the declaration's strategy.


Authors

Sunetra Gupta Sunetra Gupta (born 15 March 1965) is an Indian-born British infectious disease epidemiologist and a professor of theoretical epidemiology at the Department of Zoology, University of Oxford. She has performed research on the transmission dynamic ...
is a Professor of Theoretical Epidemiology at the
Oxford University The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the second-oldest continuously operating u ...
Department of Zoology. Gupta has been a critic of early
COVID-19 lockdown During the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, a number of non-pharmaceutical interventions, particularly lockdowns (encompassing stay-at-home orders, curfews, quarantines, and similar societal restrictions), were implemented in numero ...
strategy, arguing that the cost is too high for the poorest in society, and expressing concern about the risk of widespread starvation in many countries because of lockdown-related disruptions in food supply chains. In 2020, Gupta led a group which in March released a widely criticized modelling study suggesting, in one of its scenarios, that half the population of the
United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
might already have been infected with COVID-19, and in September a
preprint In academic publishing, a preprint is a version of a scholarly or scientific paper that precedes formal peer review and publication in a peer-reviewed scholarly or scientific journal. The preprint may be available, often as a non-typeset versi ...
study which argued herd immunity thresholds might be lower than expected due to pre-existing immunity in the population. Rupert Beale of the
Francis Crick Institute The Francis Crick Institute (formerly the UK Centre for Medical Research and Innovation) is a biomedical research centre in London, which was established in 2010 and opened in 2016. The institute is a partnership between Cancer Research UK, Im ...
described the March preprint as "ridiculous" and "not even passed by peer review". Gupta was one author of a 21 September letter to the British prime minister,
Boris Johnson Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (born 19 June 1964) is a British politician and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 2019 to 2022. He wa ...
, recommending shielding of vulnerable groups of people rather than the lockdown method of the
British government response to the COVID-19 pandemic In response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom, the Government of the United Kingdom, UK Government introduced various public health and economic measures to mitigate its impact. Devolution in the United Kingdom, Devolution meant ...
. Of the declaration's signatories, Gupta said: "We're saying, let's just do this for the three months that it takes for the pathogen to sweep through the population", arguing that the situation would only be temporary. Gupta has dismissed claims of having a
right-wing Right-wing politics is the range of political ideologies that view certain social orders and hierarchies as inevitable, natural, normal, or desirable, typically supporting this position based on natural law, economics, authority, property ...
perspective, claiming to be "more Left than Labour".
Jay Bhattacharya Jayanta Bhattacharya (born 1968) is an American physician-scientist and health economist who has served as the 18th Director of the National Institutes of Health since 2025. Bhattacharya was a professor of medicine, economics, and health resear ...
is a professor of medicine at
Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...
whose research focuses on the economics of health care. Before he co-authored the declaration, Bhattacharya co-wrote an opinion piece in ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
'' titled "Is the Coronavirus as Deadly as They Say?", in which he claimed that there was little evidence to support shelter-in-place orders and
quarantine A quarantine is a restriction on the movement of people, animals, and goods which is intended to prevent the spread of disease or pests. It is often used in connection to disease and illness, preventing the movement of those who may have bee ...
s of the
COVID-19 pandemic in the United States On December 31, 2019, China announced the discovery of a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan. The first American case was reported on January 20, and United States Department of Health and Human Services, Health and Human Services Secreta ...
, and was a lead author of a
serology Serology is the scientific study of Serum (blood), serum and other body fluids. In practice, the term usually refers to the medical diagnosis, diagnostic identification of Antibody, antibodies in the serum. Such antibodies are typically formed in r ...
study released in April which suggested that as many as 80,000 residents of
Santa Clara County, California Santa Clara County, officially the County of Santa Clara, is the sixth-most populous county in the U.S. state of California, with a population of 1,936,259 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Santa Clara County and neighboring Sa ...
might have already been infected with COVID-19. The study and conduct of the research drew wide criticism for statistical and methodological errors and apparent lack of disclosure of conflicts. The study was later revealed to have received undisclosed funding from
JetBlue JetBlue Airways Corporation, stylized as jetBlue, is an American major airline headquartered in Long Island City, in Queens, New York City. Primarily a point-to-point carrier, JetBlue's network features six focus cities including its main hub ...
's founder
David Neeleman David Gary Neeleman (born October 16, 1959) is a Brazilian-American businessman and entrepreneur. He has founded five commercial airlines: Morris Air, WestJet, JetBlue Airways, Azul Brazilian Airlines, and Breeze Airways. Along with Humberto ...
, according to an anonymous whistle blower. Bhattacharya said that he received racist attacks and death threats during the pandemic, and he also claimed that "
Big tech Big Tech, also referred to as the Tech Giants or Tech Titans, is a collective term for the largest and most influential technology companies in the world. The label draws a parallel to similar classifications in other industries, such as "Big Oi ...
outlets like
Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...
and
Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...
" suppressed "our ideas, falsely deeming them 'misinformation'". He also said that "I started getting calls from reporters asking me why I wanted to 'let the virus rip', when I had proposed nothing of the sort." Bhattacharya argued that the declaration did not take "a contrarian position, but represents the standard way of dealing with respiratory virus pandemics that the world has followed for a century until 2020."
Martin Kulldorff Martin Kulldorff (born 1962) is a Swedish biostatistician. He was a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School from 2003 until his dismissal in 2024. He is a member of the US Food and Drug Administration's Drug Safety and Risk Management ...
was at the time a professor of medicine and a
biostatistician Biostatistics (also known as biometry) is a branch of statistics that applies statistical methods to a wide range of topics in biology. It encompasses the design of biological experiments, the collection and analysis of data from those experimen ...
at
Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
. He had defended Sweden's response to the pandemic and, along with Bhattacharya, wrote a ''Wall Street Journal'' editorial arguing against testing the young and healthy for
SARS-CoV-2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19, the respiratory illness responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had the Novel coronavirus, provisional nam ...
. Kulldorff had previously claimed that people under 50 years old "should live their normal lives unless they have some known risk factor" while "anybody above 60, whether teacher or bus driver or janitor I think should not be working – if those in their 60s can't work from home they should be able to take a sabbatical (supported by social security) for three, four or whatever months it takes before there is immunity in the community that will protect everybody." He did not provide a detailed explanation about what people between these ages should do. While Gupta has said in a promotional video that less vulnerable people should be allowed "to get out there and get infected and build up herd immunity", Kulldorff cautioned against deliberately seeking out infection; he said that "everybody should wash their hands and stay home when sick". Kulldorff disagreed with criticism that the plan would lead to more deaths, calling it "nonsense". He said "fewer older people – not zero, but fewer old people – would be infected. But you'll have more young people infected, and that's going to reduce the mortality." Kulldorff has discussed the Declaration on '' The Richie Allen Show'', a radio programme that has previously featured antisemites and
Holocaust deniers Denial of the Holocaust is an antisemitic conspiracy theory that asserts that the genocide of Jews by the Nazis is a fabrication or exaggeration. It includes making one or more of the following false claims: *Nazi Germany's "Final Solution" wa ...
, although Kulldorff said he had no knowledge of the show prior to being invited on. Since 2021, Bhattacharya, Kulldorff and Gupta have worked with
Brownstone Institute Jeffrey Albert Tucker (born December 19, 1963) is an American libertarian writer, publisher, entrepreneur and advocate of anarcho-capitalism and Bitcoin. He worked for Ron Paul, the Mises Institute, and LewRockwell.com for many years. Beginni ...
, a
think tank A think tank, or public policy institute, is a research institute that performs research and advocacy concerning topics such as social policy, political strategy, economics, military, technology, and culture. Most think tanks are non-governme ...
that has opposed COVID-19 masking and vaccine mandates. The institute was started in 2021 by
Jeffrey Tucker Jeffrey Albert Tucker (born December 19, 1963) is an American libertarian writer, publisher, entrepreneur and advocate of anarcho-capitalism and Bitcoin. He worked for Ron Paul, the Mises Institute, and LewRockwell.com for many years. Beginni ...
, the AIER editorial director who helped organize the Great Barrington Declaration. It has described itself as the declaration's "spiritual child". Bhattacharya and Kulldorff were named senior scholars there. Gupta has been an author.


Sponsor

The declaration was sponsored by the
American Institute for Economic Research The American Institute for Economic Research (AIER) is a classical liberal think tank located in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1933 by Edward C. Harwood, an economist and investment advisor, and is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. ...
(AIER), a libertarian
free-market In economics, a free market is an economic system in which the prices of goods and services are determined by supply and demand expressed by sellers and buyers. Such markets, as modeled, operate without the intervention of government or any ot ...
think tank based in
Great Barrington, Massachusetts Great Barrington is a New England town, town in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 7,172 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Bot ...
, which has a history of promoting
climate change denial Climate change denial (also global warming denial) is a form of science denial characterized by rejecting, refusing to acknowledge, disputing, or fighting the scientific consensus on climate change. Those promoting denial commonly use rhetor ...
, and the benefits of
sweatshop A sweatshop or sweat factory is a cramped workplace with very poor and/or illegal working conditions, including little to no breaks, inadequate work space, insufficient lighting and ventilation, or uncomfortably or dangerously high or low temperat ...
s. ''
Byline Times ''Byline Times'' is a British newspaper and website founded in March 2019 by Peter Jukes and Stephen Colegrave, who are also its executive editors. It is a development of Byline, a crowdfunding and media outlet platform founded in April 2015 b ...
'' journalist
Nafeez Ahmed Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed (; born 1978) is a British investigative journalist, author and academic. He is editor of the crowdfunded investigative journalism platform INSURGE intelligence. He is a former environment blogger for ''The Guardian'' from ...
has described the AIER as an "institution embedded in a
Koch Koch may refer to: People * Koch (surname), people with this surname * Koch dynasty, a dynasty in Assam and Bengal, north east India * Koch family * Koch people (or Koche), an ethnic group originally from the ancient Koch kingdom in north east In ...
-funded network that denies climate science while investing in polluting fossil fuel industries".


Signatories

While the authors' website claims that over 14,000 scientists, 40,000 medical practitioners, and more than 800,000 members of the public signed the declaration, this list—which anyone could sign online and which required merely clicking a checkbox to claim the status of "scientist"—contains some evidently-fake names, including: "Mr Banana Rama", "
Harold Shipman Harold Frederick Shipman (14 January 1946 – 13 January 2004), known to acquaintances as Fred Shipman, was an English doctor in general practice and serial killer. He is considered to be one of the most prolific serial killers in modern ...
", and " Prof Cominic Dummings". More than 100
psychotherapists Psychotherapy (also psychological therapy, talk therapy, or talking therapy) is the use of psychological methods, particularly when based on regular personal interaction, to help a person change behavior, increase happiness, and overcome prob ...
, numerous
homeopaths Homeopathy or homoeopathy is a pseudoscientific system of alternative medicine. It was conceived in 1796 by the German physician Samuel Hahnemann. Its practitioners, called homeopaths or homeopathic physicians, believe that a substance that ...
,
physiotherapists Physical therapy (PT), also known as physiotherapy, is a healthcare profession, as well as the care provided by physical therapists who promote, maintain, or restore health through patient education, physical intervention, disease preventio ...
, massage therapists, and other non-relevant people were found to be signatories, including a performer of Khoomei—a Mongolian style of
overtone singing Overtone singing, also known as overtone chanting, harmonic singing, polyphonic overtone singing, or diphonic singing, is a set of singing techniques in which the vocalist manipulates the resonances of the vocal tract to arouse the perception ...
—described as a "therapeutic sound practitioner". An article in ''
The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...
'' reported that the false signatures put claims about the breadth of support in doubt. Bhattacharya responded by saying that the authors "did not have the resources to audit each signature," and that people had "abused our trust" by adding fake names.


Reception


Critical commentaries

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (, sometimes spelled ; born 3 March 1965) is an Ethiopian public health official, researcher, diplomat, and the DGWHO, Director-General of the World Health Organization since 2017. He is the first African to become W ...
, the
Director-General A director general, general director or director-general (plural: ''directors general'', ''general directors'', ''directors-general'', ''director generals'' or ''director-generals'') is a senior executive officer, often the chief executive officer ...
of the
World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations which coordinates responses to international public health issues and emergencies. It is headquartered in Gen ...
, warned against the idea of letting the virus spread in order to achieve herd immunity at a 12 October 2020 press briefing, calling the notion "unethical". He said: "Herd immunity is a concept used for vaccination, in which a population can be protected from a certain virus if a threshold of vaccination is reached … Herd immunity is achieved by protecting people from a virus, not by exposing them to it." Tedros said that trying to achieve herd immunity by letting the virus spread unchecked would be "scientifically and ethically problematic", especially given that the long-term effects of the disease are still not fully understood. He said that though "there has been some discussion recently about the concept of reaching so-called 'herd immunity' by letting the virus spread", "never in the history of public health has herd immunity been used as a strategy for responding to an
outbreak In epidemiology, an outbreak is a sudden increase in occurrences of a disease when cases are in excess of normal expectancy for the location or season. It may affect a small and localized group or impact upon thousands of people across an entire ...
, let alone a pandemic." The British
Government Chief Scientific Adviser The UK Government Chief Scientific Adviser (GCSA) is the personal adviser on science and technology-related activities and policies to the Prime Minister and the Cabinet. They are also the head of the Government Office for Science. Many indiv ...
,
Patrick Vallance Patrick John Thompson Vallance, Baron Vallance of Balham (born 17 March 1960), is a British physician, scientist, life peer, and clinical pharmacologist who has served as Minister of State for Science in the Department for Science, Innovatio ...
told the
House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of ...
's
Science and Technology Select Committee The Science, Innovation and Technology Select Committee is a select committee of the House of Commons in the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The original Science and Technology Committee was abolished upon the creation of the Innovation, Univ ...
on 3 November that the government's
Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...
, having examined the declaration's proposal, had found "fatal flaws in the argument". Concerns about the declaration had been issued on behalf of the British
Academy of Medical Sciences The Academy of Medical Sciences is an organisation established in the UK in 1998. It is one of the four UK National Academy, National Academies, the others being the British Academy, the Royal Academy of Engineering and the Royal Society. Its ...
by its president,
Robert Lechler Sir Robert Ian Lechler (born 24 December 1951) is a British nephrologist, immunologist, and academic. He specialises in transplantation tolerance and immunology. Since 2004, he has been Professor of Immunology at King's College London. Since 20 ...
, who similarly described the declaration's proposals as "unethical and simply not possible".
Martin McKee Clifford Martin McKee, Commander of the Order of the British Empire, CBE (born 12 July 1956), is professor of European public health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Biography He was educated at the Royal Belfast Acade ...
, professor of European public health at the
London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine The London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) is a public research university in Bloomsbury, central London, and a member institution of the University of London that specialises in public health and tropical medicine. The institu ...
, compared the declaration to "the messaging used to undermine public health policies on harmful substances, such as tobacco". On 7 October the British Prime Minister's Official Spokesperson said that while at
10 Downing Street 10 Downing Street in London is the official residence and office of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, prime minister of the United Kingdom. Colloquially known as Number 10, the building is located in Downing Street, off Whitehall in th ...
"we have considered the full range of scientific opinion throughout the course of this pandemic and we will continue to do so", it was "not possible to rely on an unproven assumption that it is possible for people who are at lower risk, should they contract the virus, to avoid subsequently transmitting it to those who are at a higher risk and would face a higher risk of ending up in hospital, or worse in an
intensive care unit An intensive care unit (ICU), also known as an intensive therapy unit or intensive treatment unit (ITU) or critical care unit (CCU), is a special department of a hospital or health care facility that provides intensive care medicine. An inten ...
." The spokesman reiterated that the Chief Medical Adviser to the
British Government His Majesty's Government, abbreviated to HM Government or otherwise UK Government, is the central government, central executive authority of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
and
Chief Medical Officer for England In the United Kingdom, a chief medical officer (CMO) is the most senior government advisor on matter relating to health. There are four chief medical officers in the United Kingdom who are appointed to advise their respective governments: * His M ...
,
Chris Whitty Sir Christopher John MacRae Whitty (born 21 April 1966) is a British epidemiologist, serving as Chief Medical Officer for England and Chief Medical Adviser to the UK Government since 2019. Whitty was Chief Scientific Adviser to the Department ...
, had stressed that the effects on the rest of the healthcare system were already considered in the formulation of public health advice. British
Secretary of State for Health and Social Care The secretary of state for health and social care, also referred to as the health secretary, is a Secretary of State (United Kingdom), secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, responsible for the work of the Departmen ...
Matt Hancock Matthew John David Hancock (born 2 October 1978) is a British politician who served as Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General from 2015 to 2016, Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport from January to July 20 ...
said in the House of Commons on 13 October that the Great Barrington Declaration's two central claims – that widespread infection would lead to herd immunity and that it would be possible to segregate the old and vulnerable – were both "emphatically false". On 15 October,
Jacob Rees-Mogg Sir Jacob William Rees-Mogg ( ; born 24 May 1969) is a British politician, broadcaster and member of the Conservative Party who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for North East Somerset from 2010 to 2024. He served as Leader of the House o ...
, the
Leader of the House of Commons The Leader of the House of Commons is a minister of the Crown of the Government of the United Kingdom whose main role is organising government business in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons. The Leader is always a memb ...
, told parliament: "The Government are sceptical about the Barrington declaration." On 3 November, Chris Whitty told the Science and Technology Select Committee that the declaration was "dangerously flawed", "scientifically weak", and "ethically really difficult". He explained that "Focused Protection" was operationally impractical and would "inevitably" cause the deaths of "a very large number of people".
Anthony Fauci Anthony Stephen Fauci ( ; born December 24, 1940) is an American physician-scientist and immunologist who served as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) from 1984 to 2022, and the chief medical ...
, the director of the U.S.
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID, ) is one of the 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health (NIH), an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services. NIAID's mis ...
and lead member of the
White House Coronavirus Task Force The White House Coronavirus Task Force was the United States Department of State task force during the Trump administration. The goal of the Task Force was to coordinate and oversee the administration's efforts to monitor, prevent, contain, and ...
, called the declaration "ridiculous", "total nonsense" and "very dangerous", saying that it would lead to a large number of avoidable deaths. Fauci said that 30 percent of the population had underlying health conditions that made them vulnerable to the virus and that "older adults, even those who are otherwise healthy, are far more likely than young adults to become seriously ill if they get COVID-19." He added, "This idea that we have the power to protect the vulnerable is total nonsense because history has shown that that's not the case. And if you talk to anybody who has any experience in epidemiology and infectious diseases, they will tell you that that is risky, and you'll wind up with many more infections of vulnerable people, which will lead to hospitalizations and deaths. So I think that we just got to look that square in the eye and say it's nonsense." The
Infectious Diseases Society of America The Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) is a medical association representing physicians, scientists, and other health care professionals who specialize in infectious diseases. It was founded in 1963 and is based in Arlington, Virginia. ...
, representing over 12,000 doctors and scientists, released a statement calling the Great Barrington Declaration's proposals "inappropriate, irresponsible and ill-informed". 14 other American public-health groups, among them the
Trust for America's Health Trust for America's Health (TFAH) is a Washington, D.C.-based health policy organization. The organization's website calls the group "a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to saving lives by protecting the health of every community and ...
and the
American Public Health Association The American Public Health Association (APHA) is a Washington, D.C.–based professional membership and advocacy organization for public health professionals in the United States. APHA is the largest professional organization of public health pr ...
, published an open letter in which they warned that following the recommendations of the Great Barrington Declaration would "haphazardly and unnecessarily sacrifice lives", adding that "the declaration is not a strategy, it is a political statement. It ignores sound public health expertise. It preys on a frustrated populace. Instead of selling false hope that will predictably backfire, we must focus on how to manage this pandemic in a safe, responsible, and equitable way." Europe's largest association of virologists, the Gesellschaft für Virologie, released a statement co-authored by
Christian Drosten Christian Heinrich Maria Drosten (, born 1972) is a German virologist whose field of research broadly concerns RNA-viruses, specifically in the areas of ecology, epidemiology and evolution of novel viruses ''(emergent viruses)''. During the COVI ...
saying the declaration's proposals were liable to result in "a humanitarian and economic catastrophe". The then-U.S.
National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in 1887 and is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Service ...
director,
Francis Collins Francis Sellers Collins (born April 14, 1950) is an American physician-scientist who discovered the genes associated with a number of diseases and led the Human Genome Project. He served as director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) ...
, told ''The Washington Post'' that the proposed strategy was "a fringe component of epidemiology. This is not mainstream science. It's dangerous. It fits into the political views of certain parts of our confused political establishment." In a private email to Fauci, Collins called the authors of the declaration "fringe epidemiologists" and said that "(it). . . seems to be getting a lot of attention – and even a co-signature from Nobel Prize winner Mike Leavitt at Stanford. There needs to be a quick and devastating published take down of its premises". ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
'''s
editorial board The editorial board is a group of editors, writers, and other people who are charged with implementing a publication's approach to editorials and other opinion pieces. The editorials published normally represent the views or goals of the publicat ...
accused Collins of "work ngwith the media to trash the Great Barrington Declaration" and of "Shut
ing Ing, ING or ing may refer to: Art and media * '' ...ing'', a 2003 Korean film * i.n.g, a Taiwanese girl group * The Ing, a race of dark creatures in the 2004 video game '' Metroid Prime 2: Echoes'' * "Ing", the first song on The Roches' 199 ...
down covid debate". William Haseltine, a former
Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical and Academic Area, Longwood Medical Area in Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is the third oldest medical school in the Un ...
professor and founder of Harvard's cancer and HIV/AIDS research departments, told CNN, "Herd immunity is another word for mass murder. If you allow this virus to spread … we are looking at 2 to 6 million Americans dead. Not just this year, but every year."
David Naylor Christopher David Naylor (born October 26, 1954) is a Canadian physician, medical researcher and former president of the University of Toronto. He is ICES scientist emeritus and founding CEO. In 2016, he was inducted into the Canadian Medical Ha ...
, co-chair of the
Government of Canada The Government of Canada (), formally His Majesty's Government (), is the body responsible for the federation, federal administration of Canada. The term ''Government of Canada'' refers specifically to the executive, which includes Minister of t ...
's COVID-19 Immunity Task Force, told the ''
National Post The ''National Post'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet newspaper and the flagship publication of the American-owned Postmedia Network. It is published Mondays through Saturdays, with Monday released as a digital e-edition only.
'': "Obviously, the Great Barrington fix will excite the minimizers who pretend COVID-19 is not much worse than the flu and enliven the libertarians who object to public health measures on principle ... So be it: they've been offside all along." Naylor also pointed out that a study published in August in the ''
Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine The ''Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine'' is a peer-reviewed medical journal. It is the flagship journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, located in London, with full editorial independence. Its continuous publication history dates back to ...
'' examined Sweden's "no-lockdown" policy's effect on herd immunity among the Swedish population, finding it did not improve herd immunity despite higher rates of hospitalization and death than in neighbouring countries. According to Naylor, the policy advocated by signatories of the declaration would never be the "controlled demographic burn that some zealots imagine", and because of
exponential growth Exponential growth occurs when a quantity grows as an exponential function of time. The quantity grows at a rate directly proportional to its present size. For example, when it is 3 times as big as it is now, it will be growing 3 times as fast ...
of infections would lead to a situation where "with masses of people sick in their 40s and 50s; hospitals will be over-run and deaths will skyrocket as they did in
Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...
and
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...
". With the prospect of a vaccine available within months, Naylor questioned the logic of the Great Barrington strategy, asking: "Why on earth should we rush to embrace a reckless prescription for a demographically-selective national ' chickenpox party' involving a dangerous
pathogen In biology, a pathogen (, "suffering", "passion" and , "producer of"), in the oldest and broadest sense, is any organism or agent that can produce disease. A pathogen may also be referred to as an infectious agent, or simply a Germ theory of d ...
?".
Deena Hinshaw Deena Hinshaw is a Canadian doctor who serves as a Deputy Provincial Health Officer for British Columbia and served as Chief Medical Officer of Health for the province of Alberta from January 28, 2019, to November 14, 2022, after being removed by ...
, Chief Medical Officer of Health of
Alberta Alberta is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Canada. It is a part of Western Canada and is one of the three Canadian Prairies, prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to its west, Saskatchewan to its east, t ...
, said that the declaration would lead to increased deaths, hospitalizations and cases of Long COVID. Hinshaw also said that it was unclear if infection with COVID-19 would create long-term immunity and that being able to successfully implement the declaration's focused protection strategy "is not supported by evidence." Harvard University professor of epidemiology William Hanage criticized the logic of the declaration's signatories: "After pointing out, correctly, the indirect damage caused by the pandemic, they respond that the answer is to increase the direct damage caused by it", and attacked the feasibility of the idea of "Focused Protection" for those vulnerable to severe infection, saying that "stating that you can keep the virus out of places by testing at a time when the
White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest (Washington, D.C.), NW in Washington, D.C., it has served as the residence of every U.S. president ...
has an apparently ongoing outbreak should illustrate how likely that is." He asked, "How would you keep the virus out if 10 percent of the younger population is infected at peak prevalence and with tests that cannot keep the virus out of the White House?" He called the declaration "quite dangerous, for multiple reasons", explaining that "if you do this, you'll get more infections, more hospitalizations and more deaths" and that "the greatest risk of introduction to the most vulnerable communities will be when the rate of infection is really high in younger age groups." Hanage cautioned that uncontrolled infections among the young run the risk of long-term medical effects of the disease. He added that "we tend to make contacts with people around our own age, and given that none of the older generations would have immunity, they'd be in contact networks at risk of devastating outbreaks" and further explained that blanket lockdowns were not argued for by most experts in any case.
David Nabarro Sir David Nunes Nabarro (born 26 August 1949) is a British Special Envoy on Covid-19 for the World Health Organization. He has made his career in the international civil service, working for either the Secretary-General of the United Nations ...
, a special envoy of the World Health Organization, said governments should refrain from using "lockdowns as the primary method to control the virus", a comment cited with approval by the American president,
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
. However, Nabarro rejected Trump's interpretation of his comments, saying that the lockdowns in the spring had been necessary as emergency measures, to buy time, and emphasized the need to find a "middle way", with "masks, social distancing, fewer crowds, testing and tracing" the right way forward. Commenting on the fact that 20 per cent of people killed by COVID-19 have been people aged under 65, and that about a third of recovered COVID-19 patients, including young patients, continue to have symptoms weeks after their infection, Nabarro said it was "amazingly irresponsible" not to take these risks into consideration. Gregg Gonsalves, assistant professor of epidemiology at
Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...
, described the strategy proposed by the declaration as "culling the herd of the sick and disabled", calling it "grotesque". Arguing nearly half the American population is considered to have underlying risk factors for the infection, he advocated for the prevailing quarantine strategy, since peaks in infection rates among the young were likely to correlate with deaths of more vulnerable older people. He wrote: "If you're going to turbo-charge community spread, as everyone else at 'low-risk' goes about their business, I want the plan for my 86-year-old mother to be more than theoretical." The
Francis Crick Institute The Francis Crick Institute (formerly the UK Centre for Medical Research and Innovation) is a biomedical research centre in London, which was established in 2010 and opened in 2016. The institute is a partnership between Cancer Research UK, Im ...
's group leader of the cell biology of infection laboratory, Rupert Beale, said herd immunity is "very unlikely" to be built up before a
COVID-19 vaccine A COVID19 vaccine is a vaccine intended to provide acquired immunity against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 ( COVID19). Knowledge about the structure and fun ...
is generally implemented. Of the Great Barrington Declaration he said the "declaration prioritises just one aspect of a sensible strategy – protecting the vulnerable – and suggests we can safely build up 'herd immunity' in the rest of the population. This is wishful thinking. It is not possible to fully identify vulnerable individuals, and it is not possible to fully isolate them. Furthermore, we know that immunity to coronaviruses wanes over time, and re-infection is possible – so lasting protection of vulnerable individuals by establishing 'herd immunity' is very unlikely to be achieved in the absence of a vaccine." Beale described the declaration as "not a helpful contribution to the debate". Of the declarations' signatories he said: "There's a lot of other people who have also signed it and guess what, it's the usual suspects … It's Karol Sikora who knows nothing about this whatsoever but who is endlessly self-promoting, and you've got Michael Levitt who's got a bad case of Nobel Prize disease." Beale criticized Gupta's actions, saying, "You've got someone who has a track record of saying stuff that is total rubbish, and then moving on to the next thing which is total rubbish, and she's not being held to account. That makes people pretty annoyed." Of the declaration's other critics, Beale said: "That's everyone being polite … What everyone really thinks is, 'this is all fucking stupid'."
Devi Sridhar Devi Lalita Sridhar FRSE (born 1984) is an American public health researcher, who is both professor and chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. Her research considers the effectiveness of public health interventi ...
, the
University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...
's professor of global public health, said that the declaration "sounds good in theory" but that "if you actually work in practical public health on the front line, it doesn't make much sense", saying the declaration's premise was neither "accurate" nor "scientific". Michael Head, senior research fellow in global health at
University of Southampton The University of Southampton (abbreviated as ''Soton'' in post-nominal letters) is a public university, public research university in Southampton, England. Southampton is a founding member of the Russell Group of research-intensive universit ...
, said the declaration was "a very bad idea" and doubted if vulnerable people could avoid the virus if it were allowed to spread. He also said that "ultimately, the Barrington Declaration is based on principles that are dangerous to national and global public health". He said: "There are countries who are managing the pandemic relatively well, including
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...
and
New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...
, and their strategies do not include simply letting the virus run wild whilst hoping that the
asthmatic Asthma is a common long-term inflammatory disease of the airways of the lungs. It is characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and easily triggered bronchospasms. Symptoms include episodes of wheez ...
community and the elderly can find somewhere to hide for 12 months." Associate professor at the
University of Leeds The University of Leeds is a public research university in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It was established in 1874 as the Yorkshire College of Science. In 1884, it merged with the Leeds School of Medicine (established 1831) and was renamed Y ...
's
School of Medicine A medical school is a tertiary educational institution, professional school, or forms a part of such an institution, that teaches medicine, and awards a professional degree for physicians. Such medical degrees include the Bachelor of Medicine, ...
Stephen Griffin criticized the declaration's flaws in ethics, logistics, and science, pointing out the risk of long-term effects of infection in even those less vulnerable to severe infection. He said: "Ethically, history has taught us that the notion of segregating society, even perhaps with good initial intentions, usually ends in suffering." Simon Clarke, associate professor in cellular microbiology at the
University of Reading The University of Reading is a public research university in Reading, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1892 as the University Extension College, Reading, an extension college of Christchurch College, Oxford, and became University College, ...
, questioned whether herd immunity was possible for SARS-CoV-2: "Natural, lasting, protective immunity to the disease would be needed, and we don't know how effective or long-lasting people's post-infection immunity will be."
Michael Osterholm Michael Thomas Osterholm (born March 10, 1953) is an American epidemiologist, Regents Professor at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of M ...
, an American
epidemiologist Epidemiology is the study and analysis of the distribution (who, when, and where), patterns and determinants of health and disease conditions in a defined population, and application of this knowledge to prevent diseases. It is a cornerstone ...
, regents professor, and director of the
Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy The Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) is a center within the University of Minnesota that focuses on addressing public health preparedness and emerging infectious disease response. It was founded in 2001 by Michael Osterh ...
at the
University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...
, said that the Great Barrington Declaration was "a dangerous mix of pixie dust and pseudoscience." John M. Barry, a professor at the Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine and author of a book on the
1918 flu pandemic The 1918–1920 flu pandemic, also known as the Great Influenza epidemic or by the common misnomer Spanish flu, was an exceptionally deadly global influenza pandemic caused by the Influenza A virus subtype H1N1, H1N1 subtype of the influenz ...
, wrote in ''The New York Times'' that the Great Barrington Declaration sounds attractive until one examines "three enormously important omissions". Firstly, it says nothing about harm suffered by people in low-risk groups, even though a significant number of patients who recover from COVID-19, including people who experience no symptoms, have been shown to have heart and lung damage. Secondly, it says nothing about how to shield the vulnerable, and thirdly, it says nothing about the number of dead the strategy would cause, which Barry estimates might "far exceed one million". Barry said that while it was too late for the United States to achieve "near containment of the virus", as
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...
,
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
and
Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...
had done, the US could still aim for results comparable to those of Canada or Germany, where daily deaths were a couple of dozen at the time of writing (October 2020). Writing for
Science-Based Medicine ''Science-Based Medicine'' is a website and blog with articles covering issues in science and medicine, especially medical scams and practices. Founded in 2008, it is owned and operated by the New England Skeptical Society, and run by Steve ...
,
David Gorski David Henry Gorski is an American surgical oncologist and professor of surgery at Wayne State University School of Medicine. He specializes in breast cancer surgery at the Karmanos Cancer Institute. Gorski is an outspoken skeptic and critic ...
said that the Great Barrington Declaration was a form of
astroturfing Astroturfing is the deceptive practice of hiding the Sponsor (commercial), sponsors of an orchestrated message or organization (e.g., political, economic, advertising, religious, or public relations) to make it appear as though it originates from ...
similar to that which had previously been used for
AIDS denial HIV/AIDS denialism is the belief, despite conclusive evidence to the contrary, that the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) does not cause acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). Some of its proponents reject the existence of HIV, while other ...
,
climate change denial Climate change denial (also global warming denial) is a form of science denial characterized by rejecting, refusing to acknowledge, disputing, or fighting the scientific consensus on climate change. Those promoting denial commonly use rhetor ...
and
creationism Creationism is the faith, religious belief that nature, and aspects such as the universe, Earth, life, and humans, originated with supernatural acts of Creation myth, divine creation, and is often Pseudoscience, pseudoscientific.#Gunn 2004, Gun ...
advocacy, but this time being deployed for
COVID-19 denial False information, including intentional disinformation and conspiracy theories, about the scale of the COVID-19 pandemic and the origin, prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of the disease has been spread through social media, text messagi ...
, and amounted in practice to an argument for
eugenics Eugenics is a set of largely discredited beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter the frequency of various human phenotypes by inhibiting the fer ...
. Gorski speculated whether the scientists fronting the declaration were simply being
useful idiot A useful idiot or useful fool is a pejorative description of a person, suggesting that the person thinks they are fighting for a cause without fully comprehending the consequences of their actions, and who does not realize they are being manipula ...
s for AIER or whether they were actively being "motivated more by ideology than science", but said that the practical effect was that the declaration provided a narrative of scientific division useful for political purposes. The
American Institute for Economic Research The American Institute for Economic Research (AIER) is a classical liberal think tank located in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1933 by Edward C. Harwood, an economist and investment advisor, and is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. ...
(AIER), at whose meeting the declaration was launched, has been described as a
libertarian Libertarianism (from ; or from ) is a political philosophy that holds freedom, personal sovereignty, and liberty as primary values. Many libertarians believe that the concept of freedom is in accord with the Non-Aggression Principle, according ...
think tank that has received funding from the
Koch Foundation The Koch family foundations are a group of charitable foundations in the United States associated with the family of Fred C. Koch. The most prominent of these are the Charles Koch Foundation and the David H. Koch Charitable Foundation, created ...
and engages in
climate change denial Climate change denial (also global warming denial) is a form of science denial characterized by rejecting, refusing to acknowledge, disputing, or fighting the scientific consensus on climate change. Those promoting denial commonly use rhetor ...
.
Tyler Cowen Tyler Cowen (; born January 21, 1962) is an American economist, columnist, blogger, and podcaster. He is a professor at George Mason University, where he holds the Holbert L. Harris chair in the economics department. Cowen writes the "Economic ...
, a libertarian economist at
George Mason University George Mason University (GMU) is a Public university, public research university in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States. Located in Northern Virginia near Washington, D.C., the university is named in honor of George Mason, a Founding Father ...
, wrote that while he sympathized with a libertarian approach to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, he considered the declaration to be dangerous and misguided. In November 2023 during the UK COVID-19 Inquiry, England's chief medical officer
Chris Whitty Sir Christopher John MacRae Whitty (born 21 April 1966) is a British epidemiologist, serving as Chief Medical Officer for England and Chief Medical Adviser to the UK Government since 2019. Whitty was Chief Scientific Adviser to the Department ...
gave evidence that government ministers had been 'bamboozled' by talk of herd immunity in the early stages of the pandemic, and that he thought the scientists behind the Great Barrington Declaration "were just wrong, straightforwardly", adding that the Declaration was "flawed at multiple levels".


Signatories' statements

Citing the principle Primum non nocere, first do no harm, Matt Strauss, a physician and assistant professor at Queen's School of Medicine, subsequently wrote that mandatory government lockdowns "amount to a medical recommendation of no proven benefit, of extraordinary potential harm, that do not take personal values and individual consent into account" and that "if lockdowns were a prescription drug for Covid treatment, the Food and Drug Administration, FDA would never have approved it". University of Montreal's paediatrics and clinical ethics professor, Annie Janvier, a co-signatory and part of a group of Quebec scientists critical of the Government of Quebec's response to COVID-19 pandemic in Quebec, COVID-19, said that "it's not science that seems to be leading what's going on with COVID, it's public opinion and politics". She criticized the current lockdown measures in Canada, saying that "We need to protect the vulnerable, but right now in Quebec they're not protected". David Livermore (microbiologist), David Livermore, professor of medical microbiology at the University of East Anglia explained his decision to sign the declaration, saying that "never in history have we handled a pandemic like this" and that "future generations will look back aghast". Co-signatory Ellen Townsend, professor of psychology and leader of the self harm research group at the University of Nottingham, emphasised mental health concerns, stating that "one policy decision that could have the most significant impact for young people to protect their mental health both now and in the future, would be to release them from the lockdown as soon as possible". Mike Hulme, professor of human geology at the University of Cambridge said he had signed because he had "been frustrated that there hasn't been a sufficiently open public debate in the UK". Anthony Brooks, professor of genetics at the University of Leicester, criticized the British Government Chief Scientific Adviser, Patrick Vallance, alleging that "Being a senior vice president at GlaxoSmithKline, a drug company doesn't give you the same background that others have. They're seeing things in a non-sophisticated way." Brooks also said that the high average age of the member of the British government's
Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...
has influenced their recommendations to the government, as many of the members are themselves "at risk" of serious infection.


Trump administration's support

The First presidency of Donald Trump, Trump administration was reported to support the Great Barrington Declaration, based on statements made to ''Newsweek'' and other publications by senior advisers that were not authorized to speak on the record. On 5 October—the day after the date of the declaration—Gupta, Bhattacharya, and Kulldorff met the United States Secretary of Health and Human Services, Alex Azar, an appointee in the First cabinet of Donald Trump, Cabinet of Donald Trump, and the Neuroradiology, neuroradiologist Scott Atlas, an adviser to the First presidency of Donald Trump, Trump administration's
White House Coronavirus Task Force The White House Coronavirus Task Force was the United States Department of State task force during the Trump administration. The goal of the Task Force was to coordinate and oversee the administration's efforts to monitor, prevent, contain, and ...
in Washington, D.C. Azar said the meeting was held "as part of our commitment to ensure we hear broad and diverse scientific perspectives" and that "we heard strong reinforcement of the Trump Administration's strategy of aggressively protecting the vulnerable while opening schools and the workplace", while Kulldorff stated that "we had a very good discussion. He asked many questions, and we put forth our case to protect the people who are vulnerable, and the idea of trying to do lockdowns to eliminate this disease is not realistic". Afterwards, Atlas also endorsed the declaration, telling The Hill (newspaper), ''The Hill'' that the "targeted protection of the vulnerable and opening schools and society policy matches the policy of the President and what I have advised". On the evening of 5 October,
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
returned to the White House after several nights in the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, having undergone treatments for coronavirus disease; he told his followers on Donald Trump on social media, social media on his return "don't be afraid of it [COVID-19]". Bhattacharya denied that a herd immunity strategy was recommended by the declaration, saying that "a herd immunity strategy better describes the current lockdown policy", explaining "herd immunity is a biological fact so of course we mention it, but it is not our strategy". Gupta said that "the alternative [to herd immunity], which is to keep suppressing the virus, comes at an enormous cost to the poor and to the young and not just in this country [the United States] but worldwide", arguing that the herd immunity threshold for SARS-CoV-2 will be reached in December 2020. Bhattacharya advised that until that time vulnerable people might be housed away from multigenerational households, with government support, saying that "we could do policies that would make those resources available to older people in multigenerational settings for the limited period of time that's necessary until the disease is under control, and after time, they could go back home".


Other supporters

In the UK, Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), member of parliament for Wycombe (UK Parliament constituency), Wycombe, Steve Baker (politician), Steve Baker, having signed the declaration, spoke in favour of the declaration's policies on two occasions in the House of Commons, first on 6 October and again on 13 October. Conservative MP for New Forest West (UK Parliament constituency), New Forest West, Desmond Swayne asked the Leader of the House of Commons if a debate could be held on what he called "censorship" and "the sinister disappearance of the link from Google to the Great Barrington declaration". Conservative journalist Toby Young wrote an opinion piece in ''The Spectator'' supporting the declaration and querying the credentials of its critics, claiming they were "censors" and "smear merchants" while claiming the declaration's authors were not "outliers or cranks" but there had been a "well-orchestrated attempt to suppress and discredit it". On 1 November, Euroscepticism in the United Kingdom, eurosceptic former members of the European Parliament, Nigel Farage and Richard Tice, announced in ''The Telegraph'' that an application has been made to the Electoral Commission (United Kingdom), Electoral Commission for their Brexit Party to be renamed Reform UK; after identifying the
British government response to the COVID-19 pandemic In response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom, the Government of the United Kingdom, UK Government introduced various public health and economic measures to mitigate its impact. Devolution in the United Kingdom, Devolution meant ...
as a more pressing issue than Brexit, the party is to advocate Focused Protection in accordance with the Great Barrington Declaration. On 6 October, the declaration was endorsed by ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
'''s editorial board, who called it "the best advice for how we should cope with Covid."


Counter memorandum

The John Snow Memorandum, the text of which was published simultaneously in ''The Lancet'' and dedicated site ''www.johnsnowmemo.com'', and built on a previous ''The Lancet'' correspondence piece, is a response by 80 researchers denouncing the Great Barrington Declaration and its herd immunity approach. Taking its name from John Snow, the epidemiologist who worked on the 1854 Broad Street cholera outbreak, it states that the herd immunity idea is "a dangerous fallacy unsupported by the scientific evidence". It acknowledges that COVID-19 restrictions have led to demoralization, making such an idea attractive, but states that "there is no evidence for lasting protective immunity to SARS-CoV-2", adding that "such a strategy would not lead to the end of COVID-19, but instead result in recurrent epidemics, as was the case with numerous infectious diseases before the advent of vaccination." The letter's authors were co-ordinated by Deepti Gurdasani, clinical epidemiologist at Queen Mary University of London, and included researchers and clinicians such as Marc Lipsitch, William Hanage (physician), William Hanage, Nahid Bhadelia, Isabella Eckerle, Emma Hodcroft, Florian Krammer,
Martin McKee Clifford Martin McKee, Commander of the Order of the British Empire, CBE (born 12 July 1956), is professor of European public health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Biography He was educated at the Royal Belfast Acade ...
, Dominic Pimenta, Viola Priesemann,
Devi Sridhar Devi Lalita Sridhar FRSE (born 1984) is an American public health researcher, who is both professor and chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. Her research considers the effectiveness of public health interventi ...
, Gavin Yamey, and Rochelle Walensky. Other signatories have included Reinhard Busse, Christian Althaus, Jacques Fellay, Ilona Kickbusch, and David Stuckler. In 2022, John Ioannidis, a scientist who has opposed prolonged COVID-19 lockdowns, authored a paper in ''BMJ Open'' arguing that signatories of the Great Barrington Declaration were shunned as a fringe minority by those in favor of the John Snow Memorandum. According to him, the latter used their large numbers of followers on Twitter and other social media and op-eds to shape a scientific "groupthink" against the former, who had less influence as measured by the Kardashian Index. ''The BMJ'' published responses to his paper, including a comment by Gavin Yamey,
David Gorski David Henry Gorski is an American surgical oncologist and professor of surgery at Wayne State University School of Medicine. He specializes in breast cancer surgery at the Karmanos Cancer Institute. Gorski is an outspoken skeptic and critic ...
, and Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz which argued that Ioannidis's paper featured "factual errors, statistical shortcomings, failure to protect the named research subjects from harm, and potentially undeclared conflicts of interest that entirely undermine the analysis presented."


See also

* ''Journal of the Academy of Public Health'', an unconventional journal whose editorial board includes the Declaration's authors * Zero-COVID, a public health strategy pursued by some countries during the COVID-19 pandemic


References


External links

* {{COVID-19 pandemic 2020 documents 2020 in Massachusetts October 2020 in the United States COVID-19 pandemic in Massachusetts Great Barrington, Massachusetts History of Berkshire County, Massachusetts Online petitions Open letters Right-wing politics in the United States Libertarianism in the United States Responses to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 Works about the COVID-19 pandemic