Remember early on when people who had had COVID were thought to have created big resistance, even immunity, to the Chinese coronavirus, and, when coupled with those getting the just released vaccines, this would be a good thing? But, then, Brandon won the election, and Democrats, their pet media, and the Popular Medical Experts said everyone needed to get the vaccine, because natural immunity was bunk? That it was meaningless? That it didn’t really exist? That it didn’t matter? Take the damned vaccine, peons, and we might maybe possibly let you have your lives back. Or not.
Tweets and Facebooks posts were censored, as were videos on Youtube and other social media sites, or, at least, given a “disinformation” label. And now?
The future of the pandemic is looking clearer as we learn more about infection
During the early days of the pandemic, scientists and doctors were concerned that being infected with SARS-CoV-2 might not trigger a strong immune response in many people – thus an infection might not provide long-term protection.
“Immunity to Covid-19 could be lost in months, UK study suggests,” a headline from The Guardian alerted back in July 2020. “King’s College London team found steep drops in patients’ antibody levels three months after infection,” the story warned.
But that idea was based on preliminary data from the laboratory — and on a faulty understanding of how the immune system works. Now about a year and a half later, better data is painting a more optimistic picture about immunity after a bout of COVID-19. In fact, a symptomatic infection triggers a remarkable immune response in the general population, likely offering protection against severe disease and death for a few years.
And if you’re vaccinated on top of it, your protection is likely even better, studies are consistently showing.
Here are several key questions people have been asking throughout the pandemic – and ones that researchers are beginning to answer.
So, natural immunity is rather real? Huh. Where are all the apologies from the Powers That Be?
With SARS-CoV-2, your immune system generates two types of protection: protection against reinfection and protection against severe illness upon that second infection. Let’s start with the latter.
If you’re under age 50 and healthy, then a bout of COVID-19 offers good protection against severe disease if you were to be infected again in a future surge, says epidemiologist Laith Abu-Raddad, at Weill-Cornell Medical-Qatar. “That’s really important because eventually, every one of us will get infected,” he says. “But if reinfections prove to be more mild, in general, it will allow us to live with this pandemic in a much easier way.” (snip)
These findings, published in the New England Journal of Medicine in December, are consistent with data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last month. In that study, a prior infection reduced the risk of hospitalization during the delta surge by more than 50 times compared with in people who hadn’t had a prior infection and were not vaccinated. People who had had both a prior infection and were vaccinated had the most protection.
I wonder if the Usual Suspects will block the content from NPR, the study, and the CDC?
