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Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

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Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#451

Post by gorwell »

SigmundA wrote: post #247
gorwell wrote: post #138

DR. GUPTA: "I get calls all the time, people say, 'I've already had COVID, I'm protected.' And now the study says maybe even more protected than the vaccine alone. Should they also get the vaccine?" DR. FAUCI: "I don't have a really firm answer for you on that." https://twitter.com/Breaking911/status/1436417459314171904

I think the full response better convey's his position: "You know, that's a really good point, Sanjay. I don't have a really firm answer for you on that. That's something that we're going to have to discuss regarding the durability of the response. The one thing that paper from Israel didn't tell you is whether or not as high as the protection is with natural infection, what's the durability compared to the durabilit…

The point is that they STILL haven't considered natural immunity. Why not? That is a bizarre oversight, especially at this point.

Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#452

Post by postalrat »

jpxw wrote: post #197

Pros vs cons of taking natural immunity into account: Pros: - An extremely small number of people who would get side effects now wouldn’t Cons: - Logistics: you now need to perform a blood test on every single person in the country, process the results, send out vaccine invites based on the results, and set up some system where people can prove their blood test results. None of the aforementioned components currently…

We've already don't plenty of covid tests on people throughout the past year or so. Why not start with giving anyone who has a previous positive test a card saying they have the best possible protection.

Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#453

Post by sneak »

isolli wrote: post #252
jowday wrote: post #189

The answer is pretty simple - the moment authorities start saying "well, natural immunity is probably just as good as vaccination, we'll accept that as equal to vaccination for passport purposes", a huge segment of the population who's on the fence about getting the vaccine might just opt to wait until they're infected naturally, or, even worse, get infected purposefully (EG, chicken pox parties). Which leads to more…

While not wrong in itself, your comment epitomizes everything that has been wrong with our public health response. Trying to manipulate populations into a desired behavior by lying to them is, as you point out, counterproductive in the long run.

No, that's not lying.

Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#454

Post by IanCal »

KingMachiavelli wrote: post #155

Why? Probably because everyone and their uncle self-diagnosed a bad cold as COVID-19 and plenty more would lie about having natural immunity. Still I don't understand the current approach to COVID in the US. Vaccines are safe and available yet we only just approved the use in children under 12. I have heard second hand many doctors are downplaying the importance of the vaccine for people under 18. On the other hand p…

> Still I don't understand the current approach to COVID in the US. Vaccines are safe and available yet we only just approved the use in children under 12

The main issue here is that covid is less of a problem for people who are younger.

That means rarer issues can start to outweigh benefits. It's easily possible for vaccines to be beneficial over a certain age and detrimental under.

Also - while the vaccines lower transmission they do not stop it entirely so again it comes to weighing benefits.

The other issue is about testing how well the vaccines work in different groups. Just because it works well in a 65y grandfather doesn't mean it'll work well in a 2mo baby, or help with dosing decisions.

Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#455

Post by ALittleLight »

HWR_14 wrote: post #432
billycorben2 wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am 28. A programmer with a sedentary lifestyle. I was covid positive last October and kicked it fine (verified with a test). I was tested 2 weeks ago for antibodies, my results were a “76” (I assume percentage?). Why should I get vaccinated?

People get sick with COVID multiple times, and natural immunity is more hit-or-miss with regards to protection against variants. Reinfections are also frequently nastier than the first infection. It also costs absolutely nothing and at worst will act as an additional safety that makes you feel uncomfortable for a few days. So why not get vaccinated?

The research I've seen is that people with a previous infection are much more protected than the vaccinated.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.24.21262415v...

Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#456

Post by [deleted] »

jowday wrote: post #189

The answer is pretty simple - the moment authorities start saying "well, natural immunity is probably just as good as vaccination, we'll accept that as equal to vaccination for passport purposes", a huge segment of the population who's on the fence about getting the vaccine might just opt to wait until they're infected naturally, or, even worse, get infected purposefully (EG, chicken pox parties). Which leads to more…

[deleted]

Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#458

Post by incrudible »

weaksauce wrote: post #327
Izkata wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd lean towards "probably not safe"; we only just found that teenage boys are at 6x more risk from heart problems from the vaccine than any risk from covid itself: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/09/09/teenage-boys-ris... https://archive.is/ixG5G

> Teenage boys are six times more likely to suffer from heart problems from the vaccine than be hospitalised[sic] from Covid-19 there is a large range of poor outcomes that are not "hospitalized" if they get covid. they are susceptible to getting long covid and also to bring it home and potentially infect their parents unknowingly. just because one risk is higher doesn't mean the sum of the other risks suddenly don't…

The vaccines only reduce risk of long COVID symptoms by about 50% on average:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3...

Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#459

Post by Tycho »

Yesterday in England, they published statistics that showed (among other things) the rate of non-covid deaths among vaccinated people greatly increased from March to August. By a factor that dwarfs the improvement in covid-related deaths. For some reason they didn't feel it was necessary to comment on or explain this surprising pattern. I can think of a number of explanations, but it makes me wonder if they are really on the ball, and would really make sound judgements on other matters such as natural immunity.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsde...

Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?

#460

Post by sneak »

epicureanideal wrote: post #278
mdoms wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

German culture is not as feircly selfish as American culture. They also have far lower vaccine hesitancy rates.

“Selfishness” is not how I would characterize the motivations of people who haven’t vaccinated. By the way, I have been vaccinated for months, but I can understand that others may not want to for reasons other than those I would describe as “selfish”.

Regardless of their motivation, remaining unvaccinated is a selfish choice, same as driving around burning gasoline recreationally.
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