Herd Immunity?
When Horton heard that in the herd
He could secure immunity,
He thought it wise and not absurd
To seize that opportunity.
But Horton wondered to himself
Which herd did he belong?
Was he a lemming at the ledge?
An elephant wasting tree and hedge?
Or gnu dodging crocs at river’s edge?
Who am I, Horton asked, and where do I belong?
My name, my game my fame supply
Identities I can’t deny—
Yet I’m a “who” and not a “what”
A “who” who counts within my herd.
With voice deserving to be heard
(Apologies to Dr. Theodor Geisel—the now maligned Dr. Seuss—whose limerick style invited this parody from his 1954 Random House book Horton Hears a Who!).
Herd immunity? We can thank the COVID-19 pandemic for thrusting this phrase into our everyday discourse. I can’t say I ever ran into it much before this year. But with the prospect that sometime between July and September our country will reach it—providing 75% or more of us get vaccinated—I await its arrival with joyful anticipation. What a relief it will be to finally shed our masks and reenter the world of social interactions from which we have been quarantined so long.
As creatures whose lives depend, from cradle to grave, on the care and support of others, we know full well what herds—both large and small—mean to us. Haven’t we been in herds since we were first named by our parents, thrown into the customs and traditions of nuclear and extended families? Didn’t we find some measure of identity in schools, towns, states, regions, and homeland? Herds we know, and we find a certain comfort in the company of those whose sounds, smells and faces resemble our own. And in this latter day of global cross-fertilization we find some affinity with and for those whose Heinz 57 blend of accents, customs, and appearances confirm that we belong with them, even if our tribes claim different pastures in which to roam.
In anticipation of the immunity that will soon be ours in the American herd, it is good to remind ourselves what herds both do for us, and take from us. Let’s start with the positive. For human and animal species that tend to run in herds (which by the way tend to be herbivorous rather than carnivorous, the latter prefering to live as solitaries—lions and some wild dogs being exceptions.), there seems to be safety in numbers. Those older and stronger in herds tend to protect the younger and more vulnerable. They collaborate in seeking food and water and in signaling when the group is threatened. When attacked the herd either scatters, sacrificing a few to permit escape to the many. Or they close ranks, the dominant adults positioned to intimidate or fight off would-be assailants. Human history is replete with examples of our herds—in the form of tribes, clans, and nations—doing much the same.
Herds also provide us with much of our identity. Bonds of group belonging are powerful and persistent. Why else do we celebrate and defend our ethnic, racial and religious connections, referring to even strangers in those associations as brothers and sisters? And dare we minimize the herd attachment we feel towards our various almae matres and professional sports teams? Loyalty and belonging are among the most powerful emotions we will ever experience as human beings. I’d wager that what we know as love and what we pledge in our commitments to others is in direct proportion to our sense of identification with some herd. It is here that our passion for life and our courage in its defense are most clearly expressed.
Herds are not just places of safe haven and social connectivity, however. In them we also encounter other, less uplifting realities of human life. Herds expose us to ideas and behaviors we may not like, value or accept. It is in the herd that we meet adversaries of our own kind, be they rivals, antagonists and bullies who try to exert control over us through name-calling, lying, and outright physical violence. It is in the herd that we may find ourselves or our offspring ostracized or forced to the peripheries of acceptance or protection. Herds can reduce us to anonymity. Overlooked and forgotten, we become easier prey to those both inside and outside the herd who may bring us harm. In huge urban herd enclaves or in enormous corporate and educational institutions this dynamic is common. Smaller and more intimate herds we may find in small towns or in attending small schools afford us the greater likelihood of being known, cared for and protected. Herds both give and take, and in each of them we can expect to gain immunity along with exposure.
Anthropologists tell us that our species has been grazing and migrating over the meadows, steppes, and forests of this earth for some 200,000 years. As individuals we come in both solitary and gregarious temperaments. Yet we survive to this day thanks to our willingness to live as a herding species. And so it is we have endured a pandemic that will have claimed as many as two million of our kind around the world, possibly one quarter of that number in our own pasture. It is in our herd that we have contracted a virus that has attacked some of us like the crocodiles that annually take out the weak and unlucky antelope crossing the swollen rivers of the African veldt. And it is in this same herd that we will soon move past this latest threat, group immunity reached thanks to the application of that attribute that distinguishes us from all other living species: knowledge.
Life has been characterized in many ways by poets, artists and historians. Whether regarded as a journey, an adventure, an ordeal, a pilgrimage, or even a war, for humans it remains an experience lived in the herd. That means our lives are interwoven in such a way that what affects one of us, sooner or later, affects all of us. Our independence and uniqueness is always tempered by our interdependence and commonality, a fact made all too clear to us by this pandemic. May none of us who belongs in any of the human herds that graze on this planet ever forget it.
