SERRANA, Brazil – As Covid-19 unleashed Brazil, killing nearly a quarter of a million people, high infection rates have turned the country into the perfect vaccine testing ground.
Now, Brazil is using its misfortune to answer one of the most pressing questions of the pandemic, as millions of people are inoculated around the world: can someone who is vaccinated still transmit the virus?
In the first such experiment globally, researchers on Wednesday began a project to vaccinate the entire adult population of Serrana, a commuter town heavily affected by 45,000 people in the state of São Paulo, before the rest of the country.
They say the results will help scientists around the world understand how quickly vaccines can reduce the coronavirus pandemic. And vaccinating an entire city will counter Brazil’s growing anti-vax movement and demonstrate the broader benefits of mass immunization, such as an expected rapid economic recovery with a rapid reopening of Serrana.
“It will give us information about the percentage of people who need to be vaccinated to get the herd’s immunity – no one knows yet,” said Marcos Borges, a professor of medicine at the University of São Paulo near Ribeirão Preto, who is leading the study. .