Natural Immunity Really Works
A true alternative to COVID vaccines without their risks
Anyone truly committed to following science should enthusiastically demand that any mandates for COVID vaccination also give credit for natural immunity resulting from a prior infection. The indisputable reasons are that all medical research shows that natural immunity is even better than vaccine immunity.
Before giving some of this medical data, consider that some countries are acting in a far better way than federal agencies like FDA, CDC and NIH.
Israel has a Green Pass program that provides access to public venues like museums, restaurants and gyms. It officially recognizes immunity from either vaccination or recovery from COVID infection – meaning natural immunity.
Analogous to this wise government policy is that France, Germany and Italy advise just one dose of a COVID vaccine for those with prior infection. This is a clear recognition by these governments that natural immunity really has scientific merit.
MedPage Today editorial
In May MedPage Today published an editorial titled “Quit Ignoring Natural COVID Immunity” by two physicians. Here are some highlights from it.
“Those who have recovered have an astonishingly low frequency of repeat infection, disease, or death.”
NIH reported this: “The immune response of more than 95% of people who recovered from COVID-19 had durable memories of the virus up to 8 months after infection.” This is quite impressive considering that most data on breakthrough infections in vaccinated people indicate a loss of effective immunity after about six months.
“The range of reduction of re-infection from COVID-19 was between 82% to 95% among six studies that encompassed nearly 1 million people conducted in the U.S., the U.K., Denmark, Austria, Qatar, and among U.S. Marines. The study in Austria also found that the frequency of re-infection from COVID-19 caused hospitalization in only five out of 14,840 (0.03%) people and death in one out of 14,840 (0.01%). In addition, newer U.S. data, released after the January NIH announcement, found protective antibodies lasting up to 10 months following infection.”
“There are multiple highly encouraging research reports showing that blood cells in our body, so called "B cells and T cells," contribute to the cellular immunity after COVID-19. If SARS-CoV-2 immunity is similar to other severe coronavirus infections like SARS-CoV-1 immunity, that protection could last at least 17 years. However, tests to measure cellular immunity are complex and expensive, making them hard to get and preventing their use in routine medical practice or in public health surveys of the population.”
“Given that 90% to 99% of people who recover from COVID-19 develop detectable neutralizing antibodies, doctors can use the correct test to inform people of their risk. We can counsel patients that those who have recovered from COVID-19 have a strong protective immunity, protecting them from repeat infection, disease, hospitalization, and death. In fact, that protection is similar to or better than vaccine-induced immunity. Putting that together, people who have recovered from prior infection or those with detectable antibodies should be considered protected, similarly to someone who is vaccinated.”
Natural immunity better than Pfizer vaccine immunity
This new definitive work from Israel shows how much worse the immunity is from the Pfizer vaccine than the natural immunity obtained from being infected at some time by the COVID virus. The results show why the US government is so intent on mandating use of the vaccine and ignoring natural immunity. Why? Because informed rational people with natural immunity should correctly question the wisdom of getting the jab.
Consider these results. “This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the Pfizer two-dose vaccine-induced immunity.” Over 700,000 people were included in the study.”
The study examined the risk for additional infection – either a breakthrough infection in vaccinated individuals or reinfection in previously infected ones. The chief finding: “Our analysis demonstrates that SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees had a 13.06-fold increased risk for breakthrough infection with the Delta variant compared to those previously infected [with natural immunity].” Also, vaccinees were also at a greater risk for COVID-19-related-hospitalizations compared to those that were previously infected. Even worse, after adjusting for comorbidities, the study found a 27.02-fold increased risk for symptomatic breakthrough infection in the vaccinated as opposed to symptomatic reinfection for those with natural immunity.
In other words, the Pfizer vaccine was greatly ineffective as a preventive tool compared to natural immunity.
Pandemic expert’s wisdom
Earlier this month the esteemed Dr. Marty Makary, a professor at John Hopkins School of Medicine, made news when he proclaimed “Natural Immunity Is More Effective Then Vaccine Immunity.” He said individuals formerly infected with COVID-19 are seven times more likely than vaccinated people to fight off the virus.
“It appears that natural immunity is better against the Delta variant. When you get infected with COVID, your body’s immune system develops antibodies to the entire surface of the virus,” Makary said. “Not just the slight protein that the vaccines gives you, but the entire surface. And so you get a more diverse antibody portfolio in your system.”
Most importantly he said: “One of the great failures of our medical leadership has been ignoring the half of America with natural immunity, which is the half of non-vaccinated folks.”
Are you listening Fauci?
Insights by Dr. Rand Paul
Senator and physician Rand Paul in May made a number of astute comments on natural immunity. The headline of the news story was: The science proves people with natural immunity should skip COVID vaccines.
Dr. Paul said: “To dictate that a person recovered from COVID-19 with natural immunity also submit to a vaccine — without scientific evidence — is nothing more than hubris.”
Referring to public health officials he noted: “One thing they also admitted, while at first trying to hide it, was that there are no studies showing that getting the vaccine if you already have natural immunity is of any benefit at all. They can’t show that, because it has not yet been studied.”
As to his personal situation, he said “as a recovered COVID patient, I will not get a vaccine that is not proven to help me nor proved I even need — the science deniers, bureaucrats and media typically [can] go nuts. But facts are facts. I’m no more likely to get or transmit COVID than someone who is vaccinated. We know this. Doctors know this. Scientists who design vaccines know this. Vaccines are created to attempt to replicate the immunity we get from having been infected with a disease. Vaccines are a replacement for natural immunity. They aren’t necessarily better. In fact, natural immunity from measles confers lifelong immunity and the vaccine immunity wanes over a few decades. I choose to follow the science with COVID, rather than submit to fear-mongering.”
“In a recent British study, David Wyllie and others found no symptomatic re-infections from COVID-19 after following 2800 patients for several months. In fact, there have been no reports of significant numbers of re-infections after acquiring COVID-19 naturally.”
“Shane Crotty, a virologist at the La Jolla Institute for Immunology, concludes from his experiments that, ‘The amount of (immune) memory (gained from natural infection) would likely prevent the vast majority of people from getting hospitalized disease, severe disease, for many years,’ he noted. “In this study which was published in Science, Crotty showed that antibody levels stayed relatively constant with only ‘modest declines at 6-8 months.’ In other words, Crotty found significant evidence of long-term immunity after COVID infection.”
Also noted was that “In one extensive recent study in The Lancet, Dr. Florian Kramer of the Icahn School of Medicine noted: ‘the findings of the authors suggest that infection and the development of antibody response provides protection similar to or even better than current used SARS COV-2 vaccines.’”
New research paper
Very recent medical research examined natural immunity. It noted “a study of n = 12,541 healthcare workers in the United Kingdom, which reported a substantially reduced rate of re-infection over 6 months in persons previously antibody positive: for example, no symptomatic cases were detected in persons previously antibody positive…in the study period. Smaller studies in different contexts (e.g., a fishing vessel outbreak and elderly care homes have also illustrated the highly protective effect of serum antibodies [from natural immunity].”
It also cited evidence that suggest natural immunity “wanes within a 2- to 3-year period in the majority of those previously infected, which represents a combination of lack of cross-protective immunity to mutating seasonal strains, rhythms in the circulation of different CoVs [COVID viruses], and loss of antibody-producing cells over time with ageing.”
It concluded: “Some countries have therefore recommended that individuals with a documented prior SARS-CoV-2 infection only need one vaccine dose, and/or should wait an extended period before receiving the second dose. Antibodies induced by vaccination appear to a large extent to resemble those induced by natural infection.”
African virologist’s insights
A renowned African virologist, Prof Sunday Omilabu, has cautioned against vaccinating people that have acquired natural immunity to the COVID-19 virus.
He said giving the COVID-19 vaccine to such people could jeopardize their natural immunity.
He warned that Nigeria and other African countries should handle the issue of vaccination cautiously because most Africans have an innate immunity that is playing down on the virulence of the virus. That advice should be considered for the US and other nations. What produces innate natural immunity? It may result from years of exposure to various corona viruses.
“At present, the majority of us are carrying the virus without knowing that we carry it because the immunity in us is fighting the virus and playing it down so that the virulence will not show. We only see the virus’ effects in people with low level immunity,” he argued.
“My advice would be that before we jab anybody, we should make sure that they have low level immunity to SARS-COV2 (Covid-19) virus otherwise, the vaccine could jeopardise the natural immunity that we are enjoying right away.”
His good advice was: “You should do an antibody test first, so that we can know the level of natural immunity which is our level of exposure to related coronaviruses that have been in the environment for years.” Yet the US government has not promoted such testing.
Conclusions
Why is the US government giving no credit for natural immunity when it comes to all forms of vaccine mandates? Or promoting testing for it? As with so many pandemic miscalculations the answer comes down to this: nothing must diminish getting all Americans jabbed. This is needed as much to protect the profits of vaccine makers as to protect public health, and perhaps much more. All the real, legitimate science supports honoring natural immunity. But this means acknowledging the competition of natural immunity to COVID vaccines.
Dr. Joel S. Hirschhorn, author of Pandemic Blunder and many articles on the pandemic, worked on health issues for decades. As a full professor at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, he directed a medical research program between the colleges of engineering and medicine. As a senior official at the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment and the National Governors Association, he directed major studies on health-related subjects; he testified at over 50 U.S. Senate and House hearings and authored hundreds of articles and op-ed articles in major newspapers. He has served as an executive volunteer at a major hospital for more than 10 years. He is a member of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons and America’s Frontline Doctors.