Is an Amish community in Pennsylvania’s Lancaster County the first U.S. subpopulation to achieve herd immunity against COVID-19?
So far the only evidence is casual and anecdotal—but it’s also undeniably compelling.
The independent broadcast journalist Sharyl Attkisson, formerly a CBS News reporter, thinks so too. She traveled to the area and heard from some firsthand witnesses for her news show “Full Measure.”
Her sources include an Amish Mennonite man who tells how COVID swept through his church soon after members widely shared a chalice of devotional wine.
“Of course we got herd immunity,” says the man, one Calvin Lapp. “We think we’re smarter than everybody. We shouldn’t be bragging, but we think we did the right thing.”
Of what did this right thing consist? Shunning vaccines, ignoring lockdowns and steering clear, as usual, of involvement with public health, education and government.
More from Lapp:
Oh, we’re glad all the English people got their COVID vaccines. That’s great. Because now we don’t have to wear a mask. We can do what we want. So good for you. Thank you. We appreciate it. Us? No, we’re not getting vaccines. Of course not. We all got the COVID, so why would you get a vaccine?”
In the segment, Attkisson also interviews a Mennonite scholar, Steve Nolt, who’s studying the community’s response to the pandemic’s pressures and the government’s mandates.
“I know of some cases in which Amish people refused to go to the hospital even when they were very sick because, if they went there, they wouldn't be able to have visitors,” Nolt tells Attkisson. “And it was more important to be sick—even very sick—at home and have the ability to have some people around you than to go to the hospital and be isolated.”
View the 5½-minute segment here.
Dave P. has worked in journalism, marketing and public relations for more than 30 years, frequently concentrating on hospitals, healthcare technology and Catholic communications. He has also specialized in fundraising communications, ghostwriting for CEOs of local, national and global charities, nonprofits and foundations.