Natural immunity as effective as COVID vax— years after mandates

Years after the rollout of vaccine mandates that led to the firing of thousands of workers, the Lancet has reported that natural immunity is just as effective as two doses of the Moderna or Pfizer shots in preventing both reinfection and serious illness from COVID-19.

The findings, which were published in the February edition of the prestigious medical journal, were based on a review of 65 separate studies from 19 different countries. 

“Although protection from reinfection from all variants wanes over time, our analysis of the available data suggests that the level of protection afforded by previous infection is at least as high, if not higher than that provided by two-dose vaccination using high-quality mRNA vaccines,” the report declared.

The research was funded in part by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, with senior study author, Dr. Christopher Murray hailing the findings.

“This is really good news, in the sense that protection against severe disease and death after infection is really quite sustained at 10 months,” said Murray in a statement. The study “supports the idea that those with a documented infection should be treated similarly to those who have been fully vaccinated with high-quality vaccines,” according to researchers.

However, many who lost jobs, fell out with friends or were derided as anti-vaxxers simply for expressing skepticism about the effectiveness of the shots, are fuming about the findings.

Thousands took to social media to rage over the report, with one writing: ” ‘The science’ now shows we ‘conspiracy theorists’ were right all along.”

“Why should we care that The Lancet now recognizes natural immunity? This makes my blood boil,” another fumed.

“Those of us with natural immunity were blamed for ‘killing grandma’. So what’s going to happen now? Are people going to call The Lancet conspiracy theorists too?” a third furious pundit asked.

Meanwhile, Allysia Finley wrote in an Op-Ed for the Wall Street Journal that “the false denial of natural immunity caused vaccine skeptics to dig in and fueled suspicions that public-health officials were in the pocket of vaccine makers and dishonest about other things as well.”

According to the Lancet’s findings, protection against reinfection from the original strain of COVID, as well as the alpha and delta variants, stood at an average of 78.6% 40 weeks on from the initial infection. However, protection against reinfection by the omicron variant declined more rapidly and was estimated at 36.1% 40 weeks on.

Meanwhile, protection against severe disease (i.e. hospitalization or death) remained high across all variants, at more than 88% 40 weeks on from initial infection.

The study’s authors wrote that their findings could have an impact on future policymaking, potentially ending the rigidity of vaccine mandates.

“Immunity conferred by past infection should be weighed alongside protection from vaccination when assessing future disease burden from COVID-19, providing guidance on when individuals should be vaccinated, and designing policies that mandate vaccination for workers or restrict access,” they wrote.

Caroline Stein, one of the study authors, stated that “decision-makers should take both natural immunity and vaccination status into consideration to obtain a full picture of an individual’s immunity profile.”

However, Murray said the report still emphasized the importance of getting vaccinated and boosted.

“The problem of saying ‘I’m gonna get infected to get immunity’ is you might be one of those people that end up in the hospital or die,” he said in a statement. “Why would you take the risk when you can get immunity through vaccination quite safely?” 

Many others online agreed.

“Given it’s long-term impacts on your body, probably best to avoid it where possible,” one wrote on Twitter, implying they were happy to continue getting boosters in order to remain protected.

“Anti-vaxxers will say this means getting infected with Covid is just as good as vaccination, but that’s only true if you’re not in the 1 or 2% of unvaccinated who die from the infection, or the much larger percentage who get long COVID,” another declared on Twitter.

Only 16% of the US population has received the updated booster dose for COVID-19 vaccines. Meanwhile, just 69% of the population has completed a primary series of vaccines.