{"id":87032,"date":"2021-09-30T11:18:39","date_gmt":"2021-09-30T15:18:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=87032"},"modified":"2021-09-30T11:19:08","modified_gmt":"2021-09-30T15:19:08","slug":"natural-immunity-the-biden-administrations-boogeyman-that-wont-go-away","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=87032","title":{"rendered":"NATURAL IMMUNITY: The Biden Administration&#8217;s Boogeyman That Won&#8217;t Go Away"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1>Why &#8220;Natural Immunity&#8221; Is A Political Problem For The Regime<\/h1>\n<p><!--more-->By Ryan McMaken<br \/>\nThe Mises Institute<\/p>\n<p><strong>Since 2020, public health technocrats and their allies among elected officials have clung\u00a0to the position that absolutely every person who can possibly get a covid vaccine should get one.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/s3\/files\/inline-images\/cov1_0_0.jpg?itok=p4Omfpdr\" data-image-external-href=\"\" data-image-href=\"\/s3\/files\/inline-images\/cov1_0_0.jpg?itok=p4Omfpdr\" data-link-option=\"0\"><picture><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"inline-images image-style-inline-images\" src=\"https:\/\/assets.zerohedge.com\/s3fs-public\/styles\/inline_image_mobile\/public\/inline-images\/cov1_0_0.jpg?itok=p4Omfpdr\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"360\" data-entity-type=\"file\" data-entity-uuid=\"37f499a7-162c-465f-834e-00fa8233120f\" data-responsive-image-style=\"inline_images\" \/><\/picture><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"Advert_desktop__1J5vD Advert_tablet__3QEBr Advert_mobile__1rlLc Advert_placement__1I4yb Advert_align__N0_fw\">\n<aside id=\"in-content-video\" class=\"Advert_verticallySpaced__wnPy3\">\n<div id=\"google_ads_iframe_\/21841313772,21778456762\/zerohedge\/in_content_video_0__container__\"><\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<\/div>\n<p>Both the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mayoclinic.org\/coronavirus-covid-19\/vaccine-if-already-had-covid\">Mayo Clinic<\/a>\u00a0website\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/coronavirus\/2019-ncov\/vaccines\/faq.html\">and the\u00a0 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention\u00a0website<\/a>, for example,<strong>\u00a0insist that \u201cresearch has not yet shown\u201d that people who have recovered from covid have any sort of reliable protection.<\/strong>\u00a0Moreover, the CDC page points to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/mmwr\/volumes\/70\/wr\/mm7032e1.htm?s_cid=mm7032e1_e&amp;ACSTrackingID=USCDC_921-DM63289&amp;ACSTrackingLabel=MMWR%20Early%20Release%20-%20Vol.%2070%2C%20August%206%2C%202021&amp;deliveryName=USCDC_921-DM63289\">a single study from Kentucky<\/a>\u00a0claiming that people with natural immunity are more than twice as likely to contract covid again, compared to people who have been vaccinated.<\/p>\n<p>This narrative is reflected in the fact that the Biden administration\u2019s vaccine mandates are a one-size-fits-all policy insisting that virtually all adults, regardless of whether or not they\u2019ve already had the disease, receive a covid vaccine.\u00a0<strong>The official position is apparently this: nothing except the vaccine can provide any sort of resistance or immunity. So get a vaccine. No exceptions!<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Health technocrats have repeatedly insisted that \u201cthe science\u201d points unambiguously toward everyone receiving a vaccine, even to the point of pushing vaccines for children. All this in spite of the fact the risk to children from covid is\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/nymag.com\/intelligencer\/2021\/07\/the-kids-were-safe-from-covid-the-whole-time.html\">far less than the risk a dozen common daily risks, such as riding in an automobile<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The regime has attached itself closely to a vaccinate-everybody-no-matter-what policy, and a sudden u-turn would be politically problematic. So it&#8217;s no wonder there&#8217;s so little interest in the topic.<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, in a September 10 interview, senior covid technocrat Anthony\u00a0<strong>Fauci claimed that the matter of natural immunity was not even being discussed at government health agencies.\u00a0<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.realclearpolitics.com\/video\/2021\/09\/10\/fauci_natural_immunity_vs_vaccine_for_covid-19_needs_to_be_discussed_seriously.html\">Fauci\u2019s response<\/a>\u00a0suggested that the facts of natural immunity warranted discussion at some point in the future. But the comment certainly fit the dominant regime narrative nonetheless: the facts of natural immunity don\u2019t matter for now. Everyone should just get vaccinated:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>CNN&#8217;s Sanjay Gupta asked if people who have already recovered from COVID-19 should still be required to get the vaccine.<\/p>\n<p><strong>&#8220;I don&#8217;t have a really firm answer for you on that,&#8221;\u00a0<\/strong>[Fauci]\u00a0said Thursday on CNN. &#8220;I think that is something that we need to sit down and discuss seriously.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Maybe\u00a0<em>some<\/em>day they\u2019ll get to talking about it.<\/p>\n<p><strong>But some physicians aren\u2019t as obsessed with pushing vaccine mandates as Anthony Fauci, and the evidence in favor of natural immunity is becoming so undeniable\u00a0that even mainstream publications are starting to admit it.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/outlook\/2021\/09\/15\/natural-immunity-vaccine-mandate\/\">an op-ed for the\u00a0<em>Washington Post<\/em>\u00a0last week<\/a>, Marty Makary of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine argues that the medical profession has hurt its credibility in pretending that natural immunity is virtually irrelevant to the covid equation. Moreover, the\u00a0dogmatic &#8220;get vaccinated&#8221; position constitutes a lack of honesty about the data. Rather, Makary concludes:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>[W]e can encourage all Americans to get vaccinated while still being honest about the data.<\/strong>\u00a0In my clinical experience, I have found patients to be extremely forgiving with evolving data if you are honest and transparent with them. Yet, when asked the common question, \u201cI\u2019ve recovered from covid, is it absolutely essential that I get vaccinated?\u201d many public health officials have put aside the data and responded with a synchronized \u201cyes,\u201d even as studies have shown that\u00a0<strong>reinfections are rare and often asymptomatic or mild when they do occur.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>And what are these studies? Makary continues:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>More than 15 studies have demonstrated the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/the-power-of-natural-immunity-11623171303\">power of immunity<\/a>\u00a0acquired by previously having the virus. A 700,000-person\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.medrxiv.org\/content\/10.1101\/2021.08.24.21262415v1\">study<\/a>\u00a0from Israel two weeks ago found that those who had experienced prior infections were 27 times less likely to get a second symptomatic covid infection than those who were vaccinated. This affirmed a June Cleveland Clinic\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.medrxiv.org\/content\/10.1101\/2021.06.01.21258176v3\">study<\/a>\u00a0of health-care workers (who are often exposed to the virus), in which none who had previously tested positive for the coronavirus got reinfected.\u00a0<strong>The study authors concluded that \u201cindividuals who have had SARS-CoV-2 infection are unlikely to benefit from covid-19 vaccination.\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>And in May, a Washington University\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/medicine.wustl.edu\/news\/good-news-mild-covid-19-induces-lasting-antibody-protection\/\">study<\/a>\u00a0found that even a mild covid infection resulted in long-lasting immunity.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>The policy bias in favor of vaccines ignores many other facts as well, such as the relative risks of vaccines, especially for the young:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The current Centers for Disease Control and Prevention position about vaccinating children also dismisses the benefits of natural immunity. The\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/09\/09\/us\/la-vaccine-mandate-students-schools.html\">Los Angeles County School District recently mandated vaccines<\/a>\u00a0for students ages 12 and up who want to learn in person. But young people are less likely to suffer severe or\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thelancet.com\/journals\/lanchi\/article\/PIIS2352-4642(21)00198-X\/fulltext\">long-lasting symptoms<\/a>\u00a0from covid-19 than adults, and have experienced rare heart complications from the vaccines. In Israel, heart inflammation has been\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.science.org\/news\/2021\/06\/israel-reports-link-between-rare-cases-heart-inflammation-and-covid-19-vaccination\">observed<\/a>\u00a0in between 1 in 3,000 and 1 in 6,000 males age 16 to 24; the CDC has confirmed 854 reports nationally in people age 30 and younger who got the vaccine.<\/p>\n<p>A second dose of the two-shot mRNA vaccine like that produced by Pfizer and Moderna may not even be necessary in children who had covid. Since February, Israel\u2019s Health Ministry has been\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.timesofisrael.com\/health-ministry-recovered-covid-patients-should-get-single-vaccine-shot\/\">recommending<\/a>\u00a0that anyone, adult or adolescent, who has recovered from covid-19 receive a only single mRNA vaccine dose, instead of two. Even though the risk of severe illness during a reinfection is exceedingly low, some data has demonstrated a slight benefit to one dose in this situation. Other countries use a similar approach. The United States could adopt this strategy now as a reasonable next step in transitioning from an overly rigid to a more flexible vaccine requirement policy. For comparison, the CDC has long recommended that kids do not get the chickenpox vaccine if they had chickenpox infection in the past.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The nonscientific, ideology-induced blind spot for natural immunity also prompted\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/374\/bmj.n2101\">The BMJ<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>\u00a0(the journal of the British Medical Association) to not<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/374\/bmj.n2101\">e<\/a>\u00a0that &#8220;[w]hen the vaccine rollout began in mid-December 2020, more than one quarter of Americans\u201491 million\u2014had been infected with SARS-CoV-2\u2026. As of this May, that proportion had risen to more than a third of the population, including 44% of adults aged 18\u201359.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>And yet, the authors note this fact doesn&#8217;t appear to be a part of any policy discussion at all:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The substantial number of infections, coupled with the increasing scientific evidence that natural immunity was durable, led some medical observers to ask why natural immunity didn\u2019t seem to be factored into decisions about prioritising vaccination.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>This problem is reflected in the Biden administration\u2019s drive for booster shots\u2014announced in mid-August\u2014even before there was any clinical research on booster shots at all. Even by mid-September, as one hospital\u2019s chief medical officer\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/denver.cbslocal.com\/2021\/09\/17\/doctors-swedish-medical-center-booster-shots-more-research\/\">put it<\/a>, \u201cthe data is not compelling one way or another.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>But those sorts of details don\u2019t trouble federal \u201cpublic health\u201d officials, and the Biden administration quickly moved toward pushing booster shots for everyone.<\/p>\n<h3><u>This Is Why There Should Be No Mandatory Medical Treatment<\/u><\/h3>\n<p>Of course, mandating vaccines\u2014like mandating\u00a0<em>any<\/em>\u00a0medical treatment\u2014would still be immoral even if we could list a dozen studies suggesting boosters are a boon\u00a0and that natural immunity is no good.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What if there were twenty-five studies &#8220;proving&#8221; vaccines are better than natural immunity, but only twenty studies &#8220;proving&#8221; natural immunity is better? Would coercive vaccine mandates then suddenly be justified?<\/strong>\u00a0Unfortunately, that&#8217;s exactly how many advocates for repressive covid policies think\u00a0the world should work. For these people, policy is just a matter of adding up the number of studies &#8220;proving&#8221; their side is right, and then claiming this\u00a0justifies forcing mandatory medications on millions of human beings.<\/p>\n<p><em>(It never works in reverse, of course. The fact that there&#8217;s a lot of evidence\u2014as Makary points out\u2014against vaccines for those who have natural immunity, the dominant narrative is nonetheless that vaccines are \u201cnecessary\u201d and \u201cworth it\u201d for\u00a0everybody,\u00a0always and everywhere.)<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>In the real world, however, many medications\u2014including\u00a0these new vaccines\u2014come with risks that must be weighed against potential benefits.\u00a0<\/strong>These decisions\u00a0can only be made at the individual level, where patients must make their own decisions about what substances to put into their own bodies. In other words, blanket policies proclaiming &#8220;everyone must receive this medical treatment immediately, or else&#8221; contradicts the realities of the uncertainties and varying risk levels that affect individuals.\u00a0The facts of uncertainty and informed consent\u00a0were\u00a0once considered a mainstay of medical ethics\u2014and of any political ideology that actually respects self-determination and basic human rights.\u00a0Unfortunately, the philosophy of &#8220;public health&#8221; appears to be uninterested in such trivialities.<\/p>\n<p><strong>At this point, it would be embarrassing for the regime to admit what actual scientific inquiry has shown: that natural immunity is generally superior to receiving the vaccine.<\/strong>\u00a0The regime doesn&#8217;t like to be embarrassed, and neither do the countless doctors and nurses who have long toed the regime&#8217;s political\u00a0line. So expect more of the same.<\/p>\n<p>___<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/mises.org\/wire\/why-natural-immunity-political-problem-regime\">https:\/\/mises.org\/wire\/why-natural-immunity-political-problem-regime<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Why &#8220;Natural Immunity&#8221; Is A Political Problem For The Regime<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-87032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=87032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87032\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=87032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=87032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=87032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}