{"id":83304,"date":"2021-09-08T07:53:54","date_gmt":"2021-09-08T11:53:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=83304"},"modified":"2021-09-08T07:53:54","modified_gmt":"2021-09-08T11:53:54","slug":"youre-6-to-13-times-more-likely-to-get-delta-than-someone-with-natural-immunity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=83304","title":{"rendered":"You\u2019re 6 to 13 Times More Likely to Get Delta Than Someone With Natural Immunity"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fully Vaccinated With Pfizer? You\u2019re 6 to 13 Times More Likely to Get Delta Than Someone With Natural Immunity, Study Says<\/h1>\n

In the largest real-world observational study comparing natural immunity gained through previous SARS-CoV-2 infection to vaccine-induced immunity afforded by the Pfizer vaccine, people who recovered from COVID were much less likely than never-infected, vaccinated people to get Delta, develop symptoms or be hospitalized.<\/em><\/h3>\n

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By Megan Redshaw
\nThe Defender<\/p>\n

Natural immunity appears to confer longer lasting and stronger protection against SARS-CoV-2 infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization from the Delta variant compared to Pfizer-BioNTech\u2019s two-dose vaccine-induced immunity, according to a new Israeli preprint study<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The new data could play a key role<\/a> in determining whether people who have previously had COVID<\/a> need to receive both doses of Pfizer<\/a> or Moderna<\/a> vaccines, Science reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the largest real-world observational study comparing natural immunity<\/a> gained through previous SARS-CoV-2 infection to vaccine-induced immunity afforded by the Pfizer mRNA vaccine, people who recovered from COVID<\/a> were much less likely than never-infected, vaccinated people to get Delta<\/a>, develop symptoms or be hospitalized.<\/p>\n

The study, published Aug. 25 on medRxiv, was conducted in one of the most highly vaccinated countries in the world using data from Maccabi Healthcare Services, which enrolls about 2.5 million Israelis, or about 26% of the population.<\/p>\n

Researchers examined<\/a> medical records of 673,676 Israelis 16 years and older \u2014 charting their infections, symptoms and hospitalizations between June 1 and Aug. 14, when the Delta variant predominated in Israel.<\/p>\n

The study, led by Tal Patalon and Sivan Gazit, with Maccabi\u2019s research and innovation arm, KSM<\/a>, found in two analyses that people who had never been infected with SARS-CoV-2 but were vaccinated in January and February were six to 13 times more likely to experience breakthrough infection<\/a> with the Delta variant compared to unvaccinated people who were previously infected with SARS-CoV-2.<\/p>\n

Researchers noted increased risk was significant for asymptomatic disease as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis analysis demonstrated that natural immunity affords longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization due to the Delta variant,\u201d the researchers said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a textbook example of how natural immunity is really better than vaccination,\u201d Charlotte Th\u00e5lin, a physician and immunology researcher at Danderyd Hospital and the Karolinska Institute, told Science<\/a>. \u201cTo my knowledge, it\u2019s the first time [this] has really been shown in the context of COVID-19.\u201d<\/p>\n

In one analysis that assessed more than 32,000 people in the health system, the risk of developing symptomatic COVID was 27 times higher among the vaccinated and the risk of hospitalization eight times higher, Science reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe differences are huge,\u201d said Th\u00e5lin<\/a>, although she cautioned the numbers for infections and other events analyzed for the comparisons were small.<\/p>\n

Scripps\u2019s Eric Topol<\/a> pointed out several limitations with the study, such as the inherent weakness of a retrospective analysis compared with a prospective study that regularly tests all participants as it tracks new infections, symptomatic infections, hospitalizations and deaths going forward in time.<\/p>\n

Michel Nussenzweig<\/a>, an immunologist at Rockefeller University who researches the immune response to SARS-CoV-2, said the Israeli study confirms laboratory findings from a series of papers in Nature<\/a> and Immunity<\/a> by his group, and a study by colleague Dr. Paul Bieniasz \u2013\u2013 whose team published a preprint<\/a> earlier this month showing polyclonal antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 should be resilient to future SARS-CoV-2 variants and may confer protection against future sarbecovirus pandemics.<\/p>\n

Nussenzweig said his group published data<\/a> showing people who recover from a SARS-CoV-2 infection continue to develop increasing numbers and types of coronavirus-targeting antibodies for up to 12 months.<\/p>\n

By contrast, Nussenzweig said<\/a>, twice-vaccinated people stop seeing increases \u201cin the potency or breadth of the overall memory antibody compartment\u201d a few months after their second dose.<\/p>\n

Public not getting whole truth about breakthrough cases <\/strong><\/p>\n

A closer look at the data reveals<\/a> public-health communication may be overstating the vaccine\u2019s effect on transmission and understating the scale and risk of breakthrough infections, the Intelligencer reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe message that breakthrough cases are exceedingly rare and that you don\u2019t have to worry about them if you\u2019re vaccinated \u2014 that this is only an epidemic of the unvaccinated \u2014 that message is falling flat,\u201d said Dr. Michael Mina<\/a>, a Harvard epidemiologist.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf this was still Alpha, sure. But with Delta, plenty of people are getting sick,\u201d said Mina. \u201cPlenty of transmission is going on. And my personal opinion is that the whole notion of herd immunity<\/a> from two vaccine shots is flying out the window very quickly with this new variant.\u201d<\/p>\n