Covidiots and the flaw of "Natural Immunity"

I'm "enjoying" watching the anti-vax; Covid-19 is a hoax or 'mild cold' crowd rejoice at the apparent retreat by the 'liberals', as countries begin to open up again. The pandemic is beginning to run its course, and Omicron has been demonstrated to be less dangerous (something that was not known for certain early in its spread - though some of course, claim to have known that all along). Vaccination rates and the efficacy of the vaccines has been demonstrated, and there is a dramatic slowing of the number of serious cases as a percentage of total new cases.

“Natural Immunity” is their catchphrase. Let’s be clear. The pandemic has lasted this long because some are perfectly willing to see their loved ones sicken and die, apathetic to seeing their communities ravaged, and are perfectly happy to see long-term illness and the impact of “long-covid”. As long as it isn’t them, then they will whine for the care and the drugs that would not have been required if they hadn’t been so selfish.

So the natural evolution of the pandemic, and the subsequent beginnings of openings is being heralded as proving that they were right all along, and there should not have been any lockdowns in the first place. Add to this a study (I forget where, but actually very reputable - quite surprised me) saying that lockdowns contributed only very, very minimally to reduced deaths. Personally, I do not think they could be more wrong. Here in Greece, the early lockdowns stopped the spread in its tracks, and saved many lives. New Zealand (and Australia) stopped their initial spread through border closures and lockdowns to isolate cases. 

Half-measure lockdowns failed. When Greece moved to partial opening with masks and low enforcement, cases gained a foothold in communities and began to spread fairly quickly. I've written my observations and thoughts on that before. The "official" lockdowns were almost ignored, with crowds gathering to enjoy evenings in the open. And while people were outside, they were much closer than the 2 metres recommendations. 

Now the push is to tout "natural immunity". I love this one. Natural Immunity is the immunity the body builds through the production of antibodies. How do you build the antibodies? By exposure to the virus. Vaccinations are not quite as effective as natural immunity in stopping severe cases of Covid-19 (or most illnesses). But I'd rather have a very mild dose of Covid-19 (or cholera for that matter) after vaccination than have a potentially nasty case of either because I was not vaccinated. Sure, in future, my natural immunity antibodies will protect me from a nasty case of either, but the possible price is undoubtedly higher without vaccinations than with it.

So their fundamental argument remains that it would have been better to allow everyone to catch Covid-19 to become immune in future than to have vaccinated people to reduce the number of severe cases.

I've commented on a ZeroHedge article (https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/cdcs-study-natural-immunity-explained). 

Cool. So natural immunity protects from "severe outcomes from reinfection." REINFECTION. It does NOTHING to protect from a severe initial infection. NOTHING. 

So to get the benefit of natural immunity, I have to be subjected to the risk of a severe infection, potential hospitalisation (and potential death - 900,000+ in the US alone so far) in order to get slightly better protection for a potentially severe REINFECTION.

Meanwhile, with vaccination I can skip (or greatly reduce the risk of a) severe case. Wow.

The article has a video that is actually reasonably informative and reasonably balanced. Of course, it is used by the Zero-morons as proof that Vax is Bad, it is all a conspiracy, and as one person wrote, people who vaccinate children are worse than child rapists. There is a complete, deeply crazy ecosystem out there, and the comments section of ZeroHedge is one place to observe it up close.

But I really like the article and the chart (from the CDC) that accompanied it. It is clear even though the anti-vaxxers will use it as some form of proof of their demented argument against vaccination. 

That chart is just fantastic, if you remember that all of the lines at the bottom have been exposed to Covid-19 or have been vaccinated. Only the upper line shows people who have not been ‘vaccinated’ in one way or another – by actual vaccination or by the natural vaccination of the virus itself. 

What is important is that while there are three lines at the bottom, two of those had to pass along the dark line before they could start their journey along the bottom. Being vaccinated effectively allows the body to bypass the dark line on its way to becoming one of the lower three lines – those that have little risk of an adverse Covid-19 experience. 

Meanwhile, the anti-vaxxers talk about (unproven and unobserved) long-term effects of vaccination, all the while ignoring that there are very real Long-Covid effects, and that possibly 20% or more of those who did not have asymptomatic Covid-19 are experiencing. With billions of people having been vaccinated, some for over a year now, it is not unreasonable to expect that any long-term impacts of the vaccine would be manifested by now.

What is manifesting is the impact of Long-Covid on individuals, their families and communities, on their jobs and companies, and on society as a whole. And yet, there remains a vocal minority who would very happily sacrifice their grandparents, parents, their neighbours, anyone around them (except themselves, of course, as they all accept care as soon as they are ill).

Certainly, it is wonderful news that the pandemic may be winding down, or at least should through the spring. What is sad, however, is that the natural rhythm of the pandemic will be used as evidence by the anti-vaxxers and covidiots that they were right all along. We didn’t need to take the steps that we did, and we didn’t need a vaccine. See, the pandemic is going away regardless of what we did. 

Wrong, the pandemic is going to go away because of what was done to fight it, and at a cost of far too many people dying. And the pandemic only lasted this long because of those who are happy to see those around them sicken, die or be maimed in some way for years to come.