[conspire] "immunity" (COVID-19, ...) Re: Numbers racket

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Paul Zander (paulz at ieee.org):

> Zoonotic diseases are very common, both in the United States and
> around the world. Scientists estimate that more than 6 out of every 10
> known infectious diseases in people can be spread from animals, and 3
> out of every 4 new or emerging infectious diseases in people come from
> animals

1.  They _can_ be, but that transmission rarely happens.  Even when it
does, it's very rare for human-to-human transmission to then ensue.
Fortunately.

2.  Most diseases that are technically zoonotic are, FWIW, not usually
considered to be so, e.g., smallpox, in most cases because the species
crossover occurred so long ago.

> So there isn't much of a "barrier" between animals and humans.

Again, that's _sort of_ what I was trying to tell you, that evolution
means paths to infection that work on other animals often work on us.
However, (1) we mostly aren't exposed to most diseases from other
animals, and (2) even when we are, the infection usually stops with the
initial human host.