Any other result would have been surprising. Why is this interesting, beyond just confirming what we were already 99.99% certain we knew?
-- biochemist
Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
21–30 of 361 posts
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#22Note this is to inform public health / prioritization in the short term. (Which is less necessary places like the US where there is excess vaccine supply). We know that past infection greatly reduces risk (and this helps quantify it). At the same time, vaccination is thought to cause a much broader and more durable immune response than natural infection. We'd like people who were previously infected to get vaccinated…
Not that I have any knowledge on this subject, but why would a vaccine that stimulates the creation of a bit of spike protein create a "much broader and more durable immune response" than the actual virus which I presume creates a hell of a lot more of that exact same spike protein? Genuinely curious, because my simpleton assumption would be the opposite.
It's not entirely the same. The Pfizer, Moderna and J&J (and Novavax) vaccines adjusted the protein to present a more consistent target than the viral spikes:
https://cen.acs.org/pharmaceuticals/vaccines/tiny-tweak-behi...
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#23Punchline: “The cumulative incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection remained almost zero among previously infected unvaccinated subjects, previously infected subjects who were vaccinated, and previously uninfected subjects who were vaccinated, compared with a steady increase in cumulative incidence among previously uninfected subjects who remained unvaccinated. Not one of the 1359 previously infected subjects who remained u…
However there already exist real people in the world who have had Covid twice, and who reportedly have had a much tougher time the second time around. This study helps us put some bounds on how many people this might happen to (assuming there are no mutations to the virus) but it doesn't rule it out completely, because of the prior existence proofs
Health policy is determined by probabilities, not possibilities.
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not that I have any knowledge on this subject, but why would a vaccine that stimulates the creation of a bit of spike protein create a "much broader and more durable immune response" than the actual virus which I presume creates a hell of a lot more of that exact same spike protein? Genuinely curious, because my simpleton assumption would be the opposite.
The mRNA vaccines (among others) include adjuvants that enhances the immune response.
No, they don't. The lipid nanoparticles they use seem to have an adjuvant effect, but they are also directly functional, and there's not anything else in the mRNA vaccines.
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#25the problem with live covid as the antigenic character is of course the mortality, and the morbidity risk.
there is also the instability of the spike protien in its natural form. when spike is cloven at it cleavage site it changes conformation, thus there are two faces available to the immune system; the default state, the cloven prefusion state. This makes a Naturally aquired immunity biased toward opsonizing antbodies.
the vaccine version of spike has been stabilized so as to remain in the default state resulting in a bias toward neutralizing antibodies.
so neutralizing antibodies bind to the viral spike at locations that interfere with receptor docking thus ideally preventing viral entry, while the immune system operates upon the many other viral epitopes, to produce a variant array of antibodies. This gives Tcell based [longterm] immunity.
the naturally aquired immunity involves Tcell activity upon infection, but that is the risk, as virus is capable of entering the cells before immune system begins to work against it.
this is why boosting is required beyond initial vaccine dose.
and this is why i believe it would be a good idea to take a vaccine along with naturally aquired immunity due to recovery, and you can have the best of both worlds, while not relying solely on naturally based immunity.
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#26Punchline: “The cumulative incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection remained almost zero among previously infected unvaccinated subjects, previously infected subjects who were vaccinated, and previously uninfected subjects who were vaccinated, compared with a steady increase in cumulative incidence among previously uninfected subjects who remained unvaccinated. Not one of the 1359 previously infected subjects who remained u…
"Not one of the 1359 previously infected subjects who remained unvaccinated had a SARS-CoV-2 infection over the duration of the study."
The duration of the study being 5 months.
There's no indication from this study what would happen after 5 months.
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#27I did have covid (not diagnosed while active but shown in antibody test), and I got vaccinated significantly later. This was not driven by belief in medical need, but by social/rules need. You get no "points" for being recovered like you do for a proof of vaccination.
Sounds uncomfortably like coercion...
It is coercion. People have been coerced at every step of this crisis, by the threat of police violence, by the threat of reputation or job loss, by the the threat of fines and more.
Hopefully, like we see with the wuhan lab theory suppression, as time goes on, a lot of what people suffered will come to light, and be contrasted by the benefit of the elite and political class during all this.
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#28Punchline: “The cumulative incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection remained almost zero among previously infected unvaccinated subjects, previously infected subjects who were vaccinated, and previously uninfected subjects who were vaccinated, compared with a steady increase in cumulative incidence among previously uninfected subjects who remained unvaccinated. Not one of the 1359 previously infected subjects who remained u…
That's encouraging! I got COVID a few months ago and got vaccinated recently, seems like I should be unstoppable now.
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#29Any other result would have been surprising. Why is this interesting, beyond just confirming what we were already 99.99% certain we knew? -- biochemist
It's just nice for us laymen to have more confirmation.
Re: Evaluating necessity of Covid-19 vaccination in previously infected individuals
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
However there already exist real people in the world who have had Covid twice, and who reportedly have had a much tougher time the second time around. This study helps us put some bounds on how many people this might happen to (assuming there are no mutations to the virus) but it doesn't rule it out completely, because of the prior existence proofs
If this is rare enough, it could fall into the false positive rate of the COVID test they've previously done (i.e. while the test said they had COVID, they didn't)
Could be - but the case I remember reading about involved hospitalisation.
Remember that immunisation makes antibodies but only provides something like 50-95% protection (depending on the vaccine) - it's not surprising that actually catching it does the same thing