https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/ ... -immunity/
The research indicates that one possible method for dealing with the epidemic amid a lack of other effective interventions may be multiple “intermittent” social-distancing periods that ease up when cases fall to a certain level and then are reimposed when they rise past a key threshold. The exact numbers, the work showed, depend on whether COVID-19 is a seasonal ailment like the flu and common cold — also caused by a coronavirus — or whether it is equally transmissible year-round. Depending on seasonality, the models show that social distancing occurring between 25 percent and 75 percent of the time would both build immunity and keep the health care system from overloading. As time passes and more of the population gains immunity, they said, the restrictive episodes could be shorter, with longer intervals between them.
Of course this strategy might not be optimal if it is equally transmissible year round, and/or enough of the population can't gain immunity to the virus for whatever reason, but if it's seasonal and enough of the population can gain immunity to it after getting it, then it is quite likely to be a vastly more effective strategy than imposing super strict measures for a year or more until a vaccine is developed
If the virus mutates or it turns it to be totally different then we thought it was, that calculus could change easily, either more in the direction of opening everything up, or shutting everything down
But based on the information we have now in the fog of war, it sure seems like the best option, though there are plenty of experts who agree and disagree with that assertion and it's quite possible that it isn't the best strategy, because we really dont know shit about the Coronavirus
But when we don't know the best strategy and "lots of people assume that we should kill the economy to the max for an extended period, all the way until we have a vaccine, with no easing of restrictions at all, just to be safe" and that strategy very likely won't increase safety at all or not enough to the point that it isn't worth the trade off, that's an issue, because this increases the chances of worst of both worlds scenario coming to pass