Natural Immunity

[MaxPC]

Vaccinations are useful for those with co-morbidities. Some of my friends who were deemed healthy and who did not vaccinate, ended up with a severe case of COVID. All 4 went to ICU and only one survived, barely. He is still struggling though he has been sent home. They found out later they had a heretofore unknown condition such as scarred lungs from childhood pneumonia. I had one of the milder cases of it and I had not been vaccinated at that point.

If one is healthy with no known or unknown conditions that can compromise recovery, it seems they do recover without complications. It is the unknown that can kill you though. All of life is risk: one can be healthier than the proverbial horse and end up dead tonight from a car accident or some other unforeseen event.

[Bootstrap]

You're correct, in fact that particular quote says nothing whatsoever about the topic at hand. For a quote that actually does address the topic, the study says this:

Of the 2154 SARS-CoV-2 infections during the study period, 2139 (99.3%) occurred among those not previously infected who remained unvaccinated or were waiting to get vaccinated, and 15 (0.7%) occurred among those not previously infected who were vaccinated. Not one of the 2579 previously infected subjects had a SARS-CoV-2 infection, including 1359 who remained unvaccinated throughout the duration of the study.

Most infections occurred among those who were neither vaccinated nor previously infected. The remaining 15 infections occurred exclusively among individuals who were vaccinated. There were no infections at all among anyone who had previously had COVID.

It may be that the difference is considered statistically insignificant - I'm not enough of a statics guy to know. But I do know the difference between zero and fifteen. Zero cases is not equal to fifteen cases.

Yes, that's true. So let's look at how the authors of the paper evaluate this:

Results Among the 52238 included employees, 1359 (53%) of 2579 previously infected subjects remained unvaccinated, compared with 22777 (41%) of 49659 not previously infected. The cumulative incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection remained almost zero among previously infected unvaccinated subjects, previously infected subjects who were vaccinated, and previously uninfected subjects who were vaccinated, compared with a steady increase in cumulative incidence among previously uninfected subjects who remained unvaccinated. Not one of the 1359 previously infected subjects who remained unvaccinated had a SARS-CoV-2 infection over the duration of the study. In a Cox proportional hazards regression model, after adjusting for the phase of the epidemic, vaccination was associated with a significantly lower risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection among those not previously infected (HR 0.031, 95% CI 0.015 to 0.061) but not among those previously infected (HR 0.313, 95% CI 0 to Infinity).

They do not see a meaningful difference between the groups. As for statistical significance, they had only one statistically significant finding, according to their results section: vaccination was associated with a significantly lower risk among those not previously affected.

If I am doing the numbers right, there were 28102 vaccinated employees, 15 of these got a Covid-19 infection, none of them were hospitalized, none of them died. 15/28102 = 0.000533769838445662, that's not a lot of people. But yes, it is larger than zero, and it might mean something. Regardless, that pales in comparison to the difference between vaccinated vs. unvaccinated.

[ken_sylvania]

You're correct, in fact that particular quote says nothing whatsoever about the topic at hand. For a quote that actually does address the topic, the study says this:

Of the 2154 SARS-CoV-2 infections during the study period, 2139 (99.3%) occurred among those not previously infected who remained unvaccinated or were waiting to get vaccinated, and 15 (0.7%) occurred among those not previously infected who were vaccinated. Not one of the 2579 previously infected subjects had a SARS-CoV-2 infection, including 1359 who remained unvaccinated throughout the duration of the study.

Most infections occurred among those who were neither vaccinated nor previously infected. The remaining 15 infections occurred exclusively among individuals who were vaccinated. There were no infections at all among anyone who had previously had COVID.

It may be that the difference is considered statistically insignificant - I'm not enough of a statics guy to know. But I do know the difference between zero and fifteen. Zero cases is not equal to fifteen cases.

Yes, that's true. So let's look at how the authors of the paper evaluate this:

Results Among the 52238 included employees, 1359 (53%) of 2579 previously infected subjects remained unvaccinated, compared with 22777 (41%) of 49659 not previously infected. The cumulative incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection remained almost zero among previously infected unvaccinated subjects, previously infected subjects who were vaccinated, and previously uninfected subjects who were vaccinated, compared with a steady increase in cumulative incidence among previously uninfected subjects who remained unvaccinated. Not one of the 1359 previously infected subjects who remained unvaccinated had a SARS-CoV-2 infection over the duration of the study. In a Cox proportional hazards regression model, after adjusting for the phase of the epidemic, vaccination was associated with a significantly lower risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection among those not previously infected (HR 0.031, 95% CI 0.015 to 0.061) but not among those previously infected (HR 0.313, 95% CI 0 to Infinity).

They do not see a meaningful difference between the groups. As for statistical significance, they had only one statistically significant finding, according to their results section: vaccination was associated with a significantly lower risk among those not previously affected.

If I am doing the numbers right, there were 28102 vaccinated employees, 15 of these got a Covid-19 infection, none of them were hospitalized, none of them died. 15/28102 = 0.000533769838445662, that's not a lot of people. But yes, it is larger than zero, and it might mean something. Regardless, that pales in comparison to the difference between vaccinated vs. unvaccinated.

Perhaps it is a small difference in effectiveness, but then again perhaps it is a huge difference in effectiveness. You mentioned that perhaps the Clinic employees were taking additional safety precautions - if so that would have perhaps kept the number of breakthrough cases abnormally low. Of course the demographic taking part in the study would also be expected to have fewer breakthrough cases than the general public due to age.

Maybe you can understand though why Nett found it frustrating that you kept on pretending/insisting that there was no difference in effectiveness. It would be simply impossible for natural immunity to have performed any better at all than what it did in this study.

You are correct that the data currently available seems to show the chances of getting Covid is about 7 times greater for an unvaccinated person compared with a vaccinated person. That is also irrelevant to the question of which type of immunity is more effective. It might, however, be important to the question "Which is better?"

[temporal1]

OP:

The other thread is pretty bunny-trailed, lets try a poll

nett,
would you be willing to ask a mod to add a link to “the other thread” to your OP? ^^
i appreciate this thread, thank you!

My wife is a professional, she does this for a living.
She has a degree in clinical research. I think I'll listen to what she's saying about the research.

Why do you think you have such a monopoly on "what the experts are saying"?
We've covered a lot of lies and misinformation from the mainstream narrative, but you don't see to mind that.

True. We talked to a lot of Amish face to face and hear what's going on.

We were in Holmes County today. Talked with an escavator where we're looking to possibly live. He told us him and his wife got tested for antibodies to see if they had covid. Their test revealed that both of them had had covid, they had suspected but hadn't had a real bad case of it. The man comes from Amish family-but he is not Amish. He lived in the development they're working on and pointed to one neighbor he said they were vaccinated and they got covid. Then he pointed to another house he said that neighbor also was vaccinated and they got covid .

I decided to go to the pharmacy that did the antibody test because I was sick for 2 weeks the end of July early August and I never get sick! My symptoms were achiness and fatigue but my job can do that to me sometimes so I wasn't sure. Then I got a fever of 101 so I went to get tested for covid and I got the most reliable test the PCR (2-3 day result) The test said i was negative.
However I was so fatigued at that point and running a fever and achy I knew I couldn't go to work or anywhere actually I didn't want to pass whatever I had on.

My antibody test today show that I had it and he said looks pretty strong that I had it.

So then I had my husband tested since he was close to me for 2 weeks duration of the time I was down.
He tested negative today for antibodies. My husband is type O blood which I had read a few places that it is the most resistant blood type to Covid. The pharmacist that performed our test today said we are the second couple where one spouse had the covid and the other didn't catch it from them, where the spouse that didn't catch it was type O blood. I thought that was interesting confirming what I had read.

I'm thankful that I have natural immunity now, and I have documentation that I have the antibodies if need be for the future.

My daughter+grdaughter were recently very ill, COVID tests were negative. Negative for strep, too.
My daughter suspects they had COVID. i hope they will get the antibody tests. no word yet.

My daughter was fully vaccinated, my grdaughter, 13, was not.

[Josh]

Our family doctor told us a lot of RSV is going around - one of his infant patients had to go the hospital and ICU.

RSV has nothing to do with covid and isn’t preventable either.

[temporal1]

Our family doctor told us a lot of RSV is going around - one of his infant patients had to go the hospital and ICU.
RSV has nothing to do with covid and isn’t preventable either.

from what they told me about my grdaughter’s throat, i was very surprised it wasn’t strep. poor thing.
my daughter’s throat didn’t get as bad. the child was sicker. but they were both very ill for about 7-10 days.
grdaughter first.

i’m most interested in possible covid, hoping they might now have increased natural immunity.

[Bootstrap]

Perhaps it is a small difference in effectiveness, but then again perhaps it is a huge difference in effectiveness. You mentioned that perhaps the Clinic employees were taking additional safety precautions - if so that would have perhaps kept the number of breakthrough cases abnormally low. Of course the demographic taking part in the study would also be expected to have fewer breakthrough cases than the general public due to age.

Well, we could all speculate until the cows come home.

But so far, people have been pointing to preprints of studies that have not even passed peer review, insisting that this study has proven something that the authors do not claim it proved and using words like "settled science" to describe things I don't think we know yet.

This is my understanding so far: Cases of reinfection with COVID-19 have been reported, but remain rare​.​ Cases of COVID-19 among vaccinated people have also been reported, but remain rare. There's a lot we don't know yet.

... you kept on pretending/insisting that there was no difference in effectiveness.

I doubt I made that claim. And to be blunt, I think you know that I am not pretending, that I try to steer close to the facts as I know them. It's probably better to stick with the facts.

I think I have been saying that we probably don't know yet - most of the papers people are discussing have not even passed peer review yet. I have heard discussion of other papers that reached other conclusions. I did mention that the Israeli study says the best protection was for those who had a vaccine after getting Covid-19. People are quoting that same paper to say the opposite.

The FDA hearings uncovered some very interesting things in the data for the Israeli study, which is why they decided to recommend boosters only for people 65 and over. I thought the FDA hearings showed that the effectiveness of Covid-19 vaccines is holding up well over time. But we have been using these vaccines for less than a year, we do not yet have a lot of solid information on their long-term effectiveness or how that compares to prior infection in the long run.

[nett]

This is my understanding so far: Cases of reinfection with COVID-19 have been reported, but remain rare​.​ Cases of COVID-19 among vaccinated people have also been reported, but remain rare. There's a lot we don't know yet.

Well your understanding is just plain wrong. Reinfections are rarer than breakthrough infections by at least a 25x margin. breakthrough infections are not "rare", by any normally accepted definition of the word.

At a work event with 20 people where all but myself and 3 others were vaccinated. we had 4 breakthrough infections less than 2 weeks later. How is that for rare?

I really don't get how you can throw these kind of completely inane statements out, while complaining constantly about those of us who follow the data for not "listening to experts".

[ohio jones]

Well, we could all speculate until the cows come home.

The Alpabzug is a relatively short season, actually, starting about now and lasting for two or three weeks. I take it we can look forward to a moratorium on speculation thereafter.

[Bootstrap]

This is my understanding so far: Cases of reinfection with COVID-19 have been reported, but remain rare​.​ Cases of COVID-19 among vaccinated people have also been reported, but remain rare. There's a lot we don't know yet.

Well your understanding is just plain wrong.

Possibly. But I think waiting a few months to find out is probably more productive than what we are doing now.

I really don't get how you can throw these kind of completely inane statements out, while complaining constantly about those of us who follow the data for not "listening to experts".

With respect, I don't see you following the data in these discussions, responding to questions I ask you about the data you cite, etc. I do see you throwing around lots of strong adjectives like "inane" and misrepresenting my positions.

I think it's time for me to disengage with that.