Has India Reach COVID-19 Herd-Immunity?

According to Twitter announcements by New Delhi, India, Health Minister Satyendar Jain, “In the fifth sero survey done in the national capital of Delhi, (coronavirus) antibodies have been detected in 56.13% of the city’s population.'

Separate COVID-19 tests were recently completed on more than 700,000 people across India by diagnostics company Thyrocare Technologies. The test results showed 55% of the population might have already been infected, its chief told Reuters.

Delhi conducted the first serosurvey in July 2020, followed by one each month. The seroprevalence was 22.8% in the first survey, 28.7% in the second, 25.1% in the third, and 25.5% in the fourth, said Jain.

On December 31, 2020, the WHO defined 'Herd immunity,' also known as 'population immunity,' as the indirect protection from an infectious disease that happens when a population is immune either through vaccination or immunity developed through a previous infection. However, the WHO supports achieving 'herd immunity' through vaccination, not by allowing the disease to spread through any segment of the population, resulting in unnecessary cases and deaths.