Reading Progress:

Fact Check: Does Natural Immunity Offer “Little” Protection Against Omicron?

by Dec 18, 2021Health Freedom, Special Reports2 comments

An artist's rendering of a coronavirus (image by geralt, licensed under Pixabay License)
The New York Times curiously tells us that 75% effectiveness from natural immunity against the Omicron variant is “little” protection while 33% effectiveness from vaccination “raises hope”.

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Introduction

An article in the New York Times on December 6 offered tentative good news about the new SARS-CoV-2 variant making headlines, the “Omicron” variant first detected in South Africa. Headlined “Omicron Is Fast Moving, but Perhaps Less Severe, Early Reports Suggest”, the article noted that hospitals in South Africa were reporting that people testing positive are presenting with mild symptoms: “In fact, they said, most of their infected patients were admitted for other reasons and have no Covid symptoms.”[1]

In other words, most of these patients had evidence of infection with SARS-CoV-2 but did not have COVID-19, which is the name of the clinical disease caused by the coronavirus. (Clinical disease is defined as the manifestation of symptoms.[2])

As the South African Medical Research Council reported on December 4, most people in hospitals who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 were there for other reasons, with the positive test being “an incidental finding”. Death rates were lower than what would be expected based on data from previous epidemic waves characterized by the spread of earlier variants.[3]

“Prior Infection Is Little Defense Against Virus Variant, Scientists Say”

While severe disease and deaths can lag diagnoses by several weeks, the Times noted that the observations to date were good news. However, the Times dampened the mood with the alarming claim that “early evidence” shows “that prior coronavirus infection offers little immunity to Omicron.”[4]

The link provided by the Times in that statement directs readers to another Times article published on December 2 titled “Prior Infection Is Little Defense Against Virus Variant, Scientists Say”.

The article summary states, “Evidence from South Africa, where the Omicron variant already dominates, shows a high rate of reinfection of people who have already had the coronavirus.”

The lead paragraph reads, “A past coronavirus infection appears to give little immunity to the new Omicron variant rippling across the globe, South African scientists warned on Thursday, potentially tearing away one layer of defense that humanity has won slowly and at immense cost.”

The study being referenced is discussed a bit further into the article:

Scientists in South Africa have reported a sudden, sharp rise in November in coronavirus cases among people in that country who had already been infected, in a study that has not yet been reviewed and published by a scientific journal. The authors noted that there was no such upswing when the Beta and Delta variants emerged.

They did not say how many of those reinfections could be attributed to Omicron, but South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases reported on Wednesday that when it conducted a genetic analysis on a sampling of coronavirus-positive test results from November, almost three-quarters were the new variant.

“Population-level evidence suggests that the Omicron variant is associated with substantial ability to evade immunity from prior infection,” the authors of the unpublished study wrote.

The Times follows that summary with the even more alarming message that natural immunity from infection with prior variants offers no protection against Omicron. The Times quotes a microbiologist from South Africa who said during an online briefing held by the World Health Organization (WHO), “We believe that previous infection does not provide them protection from infection due to Omicron.”[5]

The Times is not alone in claiming that the study by researchers in South Africa showed that natural immunity offers little to no protection against the Omicron variant. For another example, citing the same study, the Australian government’s health department published a statement from the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI) on December 12 claiming that the study found “that past infection with an earlier variant does not provide significant protection against infection”.[6]

“…data suggest that past infection with an earlier variant does not provide significant protection against infection…”

However, the New York Times and the Australian government are lying.

The truth is that the data that they are relying upon to support the claim that natural immunity offers little to no protection against infection with the Omicron variant shows that, while this variant does appear to significantly escape immunity from prior infection, people with pre-existing natural immunity still have considerable protection and are far less likely to become infected with it.

In fact, the estimated protectiveness against Omicron afforded to people with natural immunity unsurprisingly remains greater than the estimated protectiveness afforded to people who are fully vaccinated.

What the Study Actually Shows

The study being cited, by Juliet R.C. Pulliam et al., was published on December 2 on the preprint server medRxiv and is titled “Increased risk of SARS-CoV-2 reinfection associated with emergence of the Omicron variant in South Africa”. The researchers analyzed routine surveillance data and found that, “in contrast to the Beta and Delta [variants], the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 demonstrates substantial population-level evidence for evasion of immunity from prior infection.”

Among over 2.7 million individuals who had tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 at least 90 days before November 27, 2021, they found 35,670 cases of “suspected reinfections”. The 90-day period was used to reduce the likelihood of secondary positive tests representing prolonged infection or persistence of non-infectious viral RNA lingering from a primary infection. They did not confirm that a second positive test indicated reinfection by either genomic sequencing or requiring a negative test between the two positive results.

The researchers expected to find that prior infection would be associated with reduced protection against the Beta and Delta variants compared with the originally circulating variant. Instead, they found the opposite: natural immunity appeared to be even more protective against the Beta and Delta variants than against the original strain.

“Contrary to expectation,” the study authors wrote, “the estimated hazard ratio for reinfection versus primary infection was lower during waves driven by the Beta and Delta variants than for the first wave . . . .”

“In contrast,” they continued, “the recent spread of the Omicron variant has been associated with a decrease in the hazard coefficient for primary infection and an increase in reinfection hazard coefficient.”

The relative hazard ratio they reported for the second wave versus the first wave was 0.75. For the third wave versus the first wave, the relative hazard ratio was 0.71. For the period of November 1 to November 27, which was characterized by the rapid spread of the Omicron variant, the relative hazard ratio versus the first wave was 2.39.[7]

What these numbers mean is that people were 25% less likely to have “suspected reinfection” with the Beta variant (wave two) than to be reinfected with the originally predominant variant (wave one) and 29% less likely to be have suspected reinfected with the Delta variant (wave three) than the original variant. By contrast, people were more than twice as likely to be reinfected with the Omicron variant (most recent wave) than with the original variant.[8]

That does not mean that people had “little” to no protection against the Omicron variant.

What these numbers mean is that immunity from prior infection was 85% effective at preventing suspected reinfection with the originally predominant variant, 88% effective against the Beta variant, 91% effective against the Delta variant, and 75% effective against the Omicron variant.

Further into the paper, the authors report, “The mean ratio of reinfection hazard to primary infection hazard decreased slightly with each subsequent wave, from 0.15 in wave 1 to 0.12 in wave 2 and 0.09 in wave 3. . . . The mean ratio of reinfection hazard to primary infection hazard for the period from 01 November 2021 to 27 November 2021 is 0.25.”[9]

What these numbers mean is that immunity from prior infection was 85% effective at preventing suspected reinfection with the originally predominant variant, 88% effective against the Beta variant, 91% effective against the Delta variant, and 75% effective against the Omicron variant.[10]

To ensure that this understanding of the reported hazard ratios is correct, I contacted Dr. Juliet Pulliam, the lead and corresponding author of the study, who confirmed that this is a correct interpretation of their study’s findings. I was also helpfully put in touch with the second author listed on the paper, Dr. Cari Van Schalwyk, who likewise confirmed this.[11]

The finding that Omicron does escape natural immunity to some extent is certainly important, but it is hardly a cause for alarm. Even if someone’s immune defenses fail to prevent infection with this variant, it does not necessarily mean that they will develop COVID-19, much less severe disease. As acknowledged by the New York Times, the available data are also reassuring that, when reinfections (or primary infections) do occur, most individuals remain asymptomatic or experience only mild illness.

What about Vaccine Effectiveness?

As a simple thought experiment, imagine that a study had found COVID-19 vaccines to be 75% effective against the Omicron variant. Do you think that this finding would be reported by the New York Times as the vaccines offering “little” protection? Do you think governments would declare that this meant that the vaccine “does not provide significant protection against infection”?

In fact, a study by researchers from South Africa’s largest private health insurer, Discovery Health, and the South African Medical Research Council found that two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is just 33% effective at preventing infection during the continuing wave characterized by the spread of the Omicron variant.

“The two-dose Pfizer-BioNTech vaccination provides 70% protection against severe complications of COVID-19 requiring hospitalisation, and 33% protection against COVID-19 infection, during the current Omicron wave.”

That finding was reported in a press release from Discovery Health on December 14, which additionally noted that the vaccine was found to be 70% effective at preventing hospitalization, which is “still regarded as very good protection”, the insurer remarked.

The press release also provided an encouraging update on symptom severity among people who test positive, noting that Omicron infection continues to be characterized by “mild disease” in most people who have symptoms.[12]

Adrian Gore, the founder and chief executive of Discovery Limited, which is the controlling company of the insurance group, similarly published an article on December 15 stating that, “while Omicron seems to be more transmissible than previous variants, with a higher rate of reinfection following prior infection, its severity relative to prior variants seems less (fewer hospital admissions and a lower proportion of high care and ICU admissions compared to previous waves).”[13]

The comparative effectiveness of natural versus vaccine-induced immunity raises the question: How can 75% effectiveness of natural immunity against infection with the Omicron variant be logically regarded as “little” or “insignificant” protection while 33% effectiveness of vaccination against infection and 70% effectiveness against hospitalization—which still lower than the effectiveness of natural immunity against being infected in the first place—is regarded as “very good” protection?

If the New York Times’ reporting was not characterized by hypocritical misinformation, we should have seen a similar headline: “COVID-19 Vaccine Is Little Defense Against Virus Variant, Scientists Say”.

Instead, we are treated by the Times to the headline, “New Studies Raise Hopes That Vaccines Prevent Severe Disease From Omicron”. The article reported that scientists in South Africa found two doses of the Pfizer vaccine to be just 33% effective against infection with the Omicron variant and 70% effective against severe disease (hospitalization and death).

“New Studies Raise Hopes That Vaccines Prevent Severe Disease From Omicron”

There was no mention in the article that this was still lower than the 75% effectiveness against infection afforded by natural immunity, which was deemed “little” protection by the very same newspaper less than two weeks prior.

The article also reported that Dr. Anthony Fauci, the chief medical adviser to the White House and director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) under the National Institutes of Health (NIH), acknowledged that “two shots produced negligible antibody response against Omicron in the laboratory”, but he also said that “the protection shot up after a third dose” in an experiment by NIH researchers.

If this finding has been published somewhere in the literature, the Times does not link to it for us to determine how “shot up” was quantified by the government scientists, so the verb phrase is left wide open for interpretation. (A quadrupling of “negligible” neutralization activity in plasma samples against a “pseudovirus” engineered to carry the spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 could still be negligible.)

The Times also reported the “good news” that immunity isn’t just about antibodies, that T cells induced by vaccination also play an important role in clearing viral infection and preventing severe disease.[14]

“…virtually all [previously infected] individuals with existing anti-SARS-CoV-2 CD8+ T-cell responses should recognize the Omicron…”

There is no mention by the Times of how, even if people with natural immunity do become infected with Omicron, they still have an even broader array of cellular immune responses against SARS-CoV-2, including against the nucleocapsid and membrane proteins, than people whose immune systems were primed by the vaccine, which is narrowly focused on eliciting responses only to the spike protein.

In fact, a study published on the preprint server bioRxiv on December 9 looked at T cell responses in individuals who’d recovered from SARS-CoV-2 infection and concluded that “virtually all individuals with existing anti-SARS-CoV-2 CD8+ T-cell responses should recognize the Omicron VOC [variant of concern], and that SARS-CoV-2 has not evolved extensive T-cell escape mutations at this time.”[15]

Again contrasting with the headline proclaiming “little” protection afforded by natural immunity, we are also treated by the Times to the headline, “Pfizer’s vaccine provides some protection against Omicron, a lab study suggests.”

Note that the glass-half-full adjective choice of “some” could just as well have been “little”, but that wouldn’t as well have served the adopted political and financial agenda. There was no bewailing in this article about how humanity has potentially lost this layer of defense derived at such immense cost.

“Pfizer’s vaccine provides some protection against Omicron, a lab study suggests.”

The Times instead reported that, while the Omicron variant “seems to dull the power of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine”, data “also hinted that people who have received a booster shot might be better protected.”[16]

That Times was referring to an experimental study done in the lab by researchers from the Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI), who looked at antibody neutralization activity in plasma samples against the Omicron variant.

One would think that if the data “hinted” that booster shots would offer better protection that therefore this study must have looked at neutralization activity in plasma taken from people who received a third dose of the Pfizer vaccine. But it did not.

Rather, the “hint” that a third dose might help boost protection is a logically fallacious assumption based on the observation that plasma samples from individuals whose immune systems were primed by infection and who then got vaccinated showed greater neutralization activity than those whose immune systems were primed by vaccination.

As the AHRI summarized the study’s findings in a press release, “Laboratory research from South Africa strongly suggests that the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant escapes antibody immunity induced by the Pfizer-BioNTech (Comirnaty) vaccine, but that considerable immunity is retained in people who were both vaccinated and previously infected.”

The headline of that press release was “Omicron incompletely escapes immunity induced by the Pfizer vaccine”.[17]

“However, the escape was incomplete, with 5 of the participants, all previously infected, showing relatively high neutralization titers with Omicron.”

But that’s not what the study found. Rather, what the data showed is that Omicron does not escape immunity induced by infection among individuals who were subsequently also vaccinated. The lack of “complete”escape was attributed to the inclusion of blood samples from these individuals with pre-existing natural immunity in the study.

That is explicitly stated by the authors in their paper, which was made available online as a preprint (not yet peer-reviewed). Among the plasma samples from six individuals with no evidence of prior SARS-CoV-2 infection, there was “a 41-fold decline” in neutralization activity against Omicron compared to neutralization of the D614G variant that was predominant during South Africa’s first wave. “However, the escape was incomplete,” the researchers remarked, “with 5 of the participants, all previously infected, showing relatively high neutralization titers with Omicron.”

Reiterating, the authors remarked that the lack of “complete”escape was due to the inclusion of individuals with pre-existing natural immunity: their results showed “extensive escape” with Omicron, but “escape was incomplete” because they included samples from participants whose “relatively high neutralization titers” were “due to previous infection.”[18]

“[T]he experiments will not be able to say much about how well boosters protect against Omicron until researchers directly test antibodies from people who have received them.”

That the conclusion cannot be logically drawn that therefore booster shots will offer strong protection against the Omicron variant among vaccinated individuals without pre-existing immunity was acknowledged by the senior author of the study in a comment to the New York Times, reported near the end of the article: Alex Sigal, a virologist with AHRI, “said the experiments will not be able to say much about how well boosters protect against Omicron until researchers directly test antibodies from people who have received them.”[19]

In sum, the message being conveyed to the public is that natural immunity offers little to no protection against the Omicron variant, and therefore even individuals who’ve already recovered from SARS-CoV-2 need to get fully vaccinated, and those who are already fully vaccinated need to get a booster dose. The truth is that the data actually show that natural immunity is still far more effective than being fully vaccinated, and there are no data yet showing that booster shots will be a safe and effective way to achieve protection against Omicron.

In Vitro Studies Are a Poor Predictor of In Vivo Immune Responses

Another important point is that laboratory studies are not necessarily predictive of how the immune system will respond when challenged by a pathogen like SARS-CoV-2. Findings from in vitro studies (in the lab) are not necessarily valid for predicting outcomes in vivo (in the living body).

“[A]ntibodies don’t seem to play an important role in controlling acute COVID-19. Instead, T cells and helper T cells in particular are associated with protective immune responses.”

Significantly, such in vitro studies completely ignore the role of cell-mediated immunity, which is at least equally if not more important than the role of antibodies in terms of protection against severe disease.

As observed by La Jolla Institute for Immunology, “the bulk of evidence” points toward “a much bigger role for T cells than antibodies”. While playing a role in preventing SARS-CoV-2 from infecting cells, “antibodies don’t seem to play an important role in controlling acute COVID-19. Instead, T cells and helper T cells in particular are associated with protective immune responses.”[20]

Additionally, such in vitro studies completely ignore the existence of immunological memory that exists with natural immunity. Studies have shown that neutralizing antibodies persist in the vast majority of individuals who recover from SARS-CoV-2 infection for as long asobservationshave been made.[21]

In comparison, studies have consistently shown that the humoral, or antibody, immunity induced by COVID-19 vaccines is significantly less durable.[22] A study published in The Lancet found that the effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine after just five months waned to 47%.[23] A Lancet preprint study by Swedish researchers similarly found that the effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine against infection waned to 47% between four and six months. After seven months, the vaccine showed no significant effectiveness.[24]

But even if antibodies in the blood of individuals who’ve recovered from SARS-CoV-2 infection did drop below a detectable level, it would not mean that they’ve lost their immunity both because of cellular immunity and immunological memory. Infection induces bone marrow plasma cells that are a marker of long-lived immunity and are capable of rapidly ramping up antibody production in the event of re-exposure to the virus.[25]

In fact, the authors of the South African study finding natural immunity to be 75% effective against reinfection with the Omicron variant remarked on how their findings with respect to the protection against Beta and Delta variants was at odds with predictions based on in vitro neutralization studies.

As they observed, “Laboratory-based studies suggest that convalescent serum has a reduced neutralizing effect on the Beta and Delta variants compared to wild type virus [i.e., the original strain from Wuhan, China] in vitro; however, this finding does not necessarily translate into immune escape at the population level.”

Their own findings indicated that “there was no population-level evidence of immune escape associated with emergence of the Beta or Delta variants.” While they made no mention of immunological memory induced by infection, they commented that “Non-neutralizing antibodies and T-cell responses could explain the apparent disjuncture between our findings and the in vitro immune escape demonstrated by both Beta and Delta.”[26]

Conclusion

The New York Times and the Australian government have claimed that a study by South African researchers found that natural immunity induced by prior infection with SARS-CoV-2 offers little or insignificant protection against the newly discovered Omicron variant. In fact, what that study showed is that the estimated effectiveness of pre-existing natural immunity against infection with this variant is approximately 75%.

At the same time, the media and government health officials are claiming that fully vaccinated individuals are still protected and that getting a third dose of mRNA COVID-19 vaccine will help boost protection against Omicron, even though the estimated effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine against this variant is just 33% and no studies have yet evaluated the benefits versus risks of a booster dose against Omicron in vivo.

How can 75% effectiveness against infection from natural immunity be deemed “little” and “insignificant” protection while 33% effectiveness from the COVID-19 vaccine “raises hope”? Clearly, there is an agenda being served here.

The fact that natural immunity is being so dishonestly downplayed and the vaccines are being so dishonestly glorified despite their demonstrable failure to live up to the promise of long-lasting sterilizing immunity illustrates how the political and financial agenda of achieving high vaccination rates even among those who are already immune supersedes the goal of empowering people with the knowledge they need to be able to make an informed choice about what is in the best interests of their own health.

Rating: The New York Times’ claim that the study showed that natural immunity offers “little” protection against the Omicron variant is FALSE. The Australian government’s claim that the study showed that natural immunity offers no significant protection against this variant is FALSE. The claim being made by government officials and the media that a booster dose of COVID-19 vaccine will be a safe and effective way of protecting against the Omicron variant is UNSUPPORTED.

[Update, December 20, 2021: At the time this article was published, I had received a reply from Dr. Cari Van Schalwyk but not yet from Dr. Juliet Pulliam, whom I was initially told was too overwhelmed with inquiries to be able to get back me right away. Dr. Pulliam has since replied to my email to likewise confirm that I had correctly interpreted their data. The article has been updated to note this. In her reply, Dr. Pulliam added, “I do think it’s important to highlight that the numbers provide a snapshot of time. They were based on analysis of data from 1-27 November, so only captured the early Omicron dynamics, and the signal of immune evasion has strengthened in the intervening time periods. Also, the precise values of the estimates depend to some extent on our assumptions regarding observation probabilities.”]

References

[1] Lynsey Chutel and Richard Pérez-Peña, “Prior Infection Is Little Defense Against Virus Variant, Scientists Say”, New York Times, December 2, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/02/world/africa/virus-omicron-variant-reinfection.html.

[2] Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Glossary, Principles in Epidemiology in Public Health Practice, Third Edition, reviewed July 2, 2014, accessed December 17, 2021, https://www.cdc.gov/csels/dsepd/ss1978/glossary.html.

[3] South African Medical Research Council, “Tshwane District Omicron Variant Patient Profile – Early Features”, SAMRC.ac.za, December 4, 2021, https://www.samrc.ac.za/news/tshwane-district-omicron-variant-patient-profile-early-features.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Chutel and Pérez-Peña.

[6] Australian Government Department of Health, “ATAGI statement on the Omicron variant and timing of COVID-19 booster vaccination”, Health.gov.au, December 12, 2021, https://www.health.gov.au/news/atagi-statement-on-the-omicron-variant-and-timing-of-covid-19-booster-vaccination.

[7] Juliet R.C. Pulliam et al., “Increased risk of SARS-CoV-2 reinfection associated with emergence of the Omicron variant in South Africa”, medRxiv, December 2, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.11.11.21266068.

[8] 1 – 0.75 = .25, or 25%. 1 – 0.71 = .29, or 29%.

[9] Pulliam et al.

[10] 1 – 0.15 = .85, or 85%. 1 – 0.12 = .88, or 88%. 1 – 0.25 = .75, or 75%.

[11] Email correspondence from Dr. Cari Van Schalwyk, December 14, 2021. Email correspondence from Dr. Juliet Pulliam, December 20, 2021.

[12] Discovery Health, “Discovery Health, South Africa’s largest private health insurance administrator, releases at-scale, real-world analysis of Omicron outbreak based on 211 000 COVID-19 test results in South Africa, including collaboration with the South Africa”, Discovery.co.za, December 14, 2021, https://www.discovery.co.za/corporate/news-room#/pressreleases/discovery-health-south-africas-largest-private-health-insurance-administrator-releases-at-scale-real-world-analysis-of-omicron-outbreak-based-dot-dot-dot-3150697.

[13] Adrian Gore, “Discovery Health releases critical insights on Omicron”, LinkedIn, December 15, 2021, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/discovery-health-releases-critical-insights-omicron-adrian-gore/.

[14] Carl Zimmer and Sheryl Stolberg, “New Studies Raise Hopes That Vaccines Prevent Severe Disease From Omicron”, New York Times, December 15, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/15/health/omicron-vaccine-severe-disease.html.

[15] Andrew D Redd et al., “Minimal cross-over between mutations associated with Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 and CD8+ T cell epitopes identified in COVID-19 convalescent individuals”, bioRxiv, December 9, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.12.06.471446.

[16] Carl Zimmer and Benjamin Mueller, “Pfizer’s vaccine provides some protection against Omicron, a lab study suggests.” New York Times, December 7, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/07/health/omicron-variant-pfizer-vaccine.html.

[17] Africa Health Research Institute, “Omicron incompletely escapes immunity induced by the Pfizer vaccine”, AHRI.org, December 7, 2021, https://www.ahri.org/omicron-incompletely-escapes-immunity-induced-by-the-pfizer-vaccine/.

[18] Sandile Cele et al., “SARS-CoV-2 Omicron has extensive but incomplete escape of Pfizer BNT162b2 elicited neutralization and requires ACE for infection”, AHRI.org, December 7, 2021, https://www.ahri.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/MEDRXIV-2021-267417v1-Sigal.pdf.

[19] Zimmer and Mueller.

[20] La Jolla Institute for Immunology, “T cells take the lead in controlling SARS-CoV-2 and reducing COVID-19 disease severity”, LJI.org, September 16, 2020, https://www.lji.org/news-events/news/post/t-cells-take-the-lead-in-controlling-sars-cov-2-and-reducing-covid-19-disease-severity/.

[21] Christian Gaebler et al., “Evolution of antibody immunity to SARS-CoV-2”, Nature, January 18, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03207-w. Antonia Bertoletti et al., “The T-cell response to SARS-CoV-2: kinetic and quantitative aspects and the case for their protective role”, Oxford Open Immunology, February 23, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfimm/iqab006. Jianmin Zuo et al., “Robust SARS-CoV-2-specific T cell immunity is maintained at 6 months following primary infection”, Nature Immunology, March 5, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41590-021-00902-8. Jun Wu et al., “SARS-CoV-2 infection induces sustained humoral immune responses in convalescent patients following symptomatic COVID-19”, Nature Communications, March 22, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-22034-1. Kristen W. Cohen et al., “Longitudinal analysis shows durable and broad immune memory after SARS-CoV-2 infection with persisting antibody responses and memory B and T cells”, Cell Reports Medicine, July 14, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xcrm.2021.100354. Tongcui Ma et al., “Protracted yet Coordinated Differentiation of Long-Lived SARS-CoV-2-Specific CD8+ T Cells during Convalescence”, Journal of Immunology, September 1, 2021, https://doi.org/10.4049/jimmunol.2100465. T. Eyran et al., “The longitudinal kinetics of antibodies in COVID-19 recovered patients over 14 months”, medRxiv, September 21, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.09.16.21263693. Maria Skaalum Petersen et al., “SARS-CoV-2 Natural Antibody Response Persists for at Least 12 Months in a Nationwide Study From the Faroe Islands”, Open Forum Infectious Diseases, July 15, 2021,https://doi.org/10.1093/ofid/ofab378.Anu Haveri et al., “Persistence of neutralizing antibodies a year after SARS-CoV-2 infection in humans”, European Journal of Immunology, September 27, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1002/eji.202149535. Jie Zhang et al., “One-year sustained cellular and humoral immunities of COVID-19 convalescents”, Clinical Infectious Diseases, October 5, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1093/cid/ciab884.

[22] David H. Canaday et al., “Significant reduction in humoral immunity among healthcare workers and nursing home residents 6 months after COVID-19 BNT162b2 mRNA vaccination”, medRxiv, August 20, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.15.21262067. Mehul S. Suthar et al., “Durability of immune responses to the BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine”, bioRxiv, September 30, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.09.30.462488. Ariel Israel et al., “Large-scale study of antibody titer decay following BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine or SARS-CoV-2 infection”, medRxiv, August 22, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.19.21262111. T. Eyran et al., “The longitudinal kinetics of antibodies in COVID-19 recovered patients over 14 months”, medRxiv, September 21, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.09.16.21263693. For further discussion, see: Jeremy R. Hammond, “Antibodies Are More Durable with Natural Immunity Than with Vaccination”, JeremyRHammond.com, November 5, 2021, https://www.jeremyrhammond.com/2021/11/05/antibodies-are-more-durable-with-natural-immunity-than-with-vaccination/.

[23] Sara Y Tartoff et al., “Effectiveness of mRNA BNT162b2 COVID-19 vaccine up to 6 months in a large integrated health system in the USA: a retrospective cohort study”, The Lancet, October 4, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02183-8.

[24] Peter Nordström et al., “Effectiveness of Covid-19 Vaccination Against Risk of Symptomatic Infection, Hospitalization, and Death Up to 9 Months: A Swedish Total-Population Cohort Study”, SSRN, October 25, 2021, https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3949410.

[25] Jackson S. Turner et al., “SARS-CoV-2 infection induces long-lived bone marrow plasma cells in humans”, Nature, May 24, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03647-4. Ewen Callaway, “Had COVID? You’ll probably make antibodies for a lifetime”, Nature, May 26, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-01442-9.

[26] Pulliam et al.

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  • bdgood says:

    The truth is that the data that they are relying upon to support the claim that natural immunity offers little to no protection against infection with the Omicron variant shows that, while this variant does appear to significantly escape immunity from prior infection, people with pre-existing natural immunity still have considerable protection and are far less likely to become infected with it.

    Jeremy, I don’t understand what you are saying here. What’s the difference between immunity from prior infection vs. pre-existing natural immunity?

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