Provincial gov'ts ending hospital mask mandates

Most Canadian provincial governments have ended their facemask mandates for hospitals.  

Why mask mandates are lifting in hospitals across Canada | CBC News - Adam Miller: 

April 15, 2023 - "Mask mandates are lifting in hospitals, long-term care homes and other health-care facilities across the country, marking an end to some of the last remaining public health restrictions against COVID-19 in Canada. British Columbia and Saskatchewan are the latest provinces to lift universal mask mandates in health-care settings, while most other provinces have either previously removed them, left them up to individual hospitals to decide, or will likely soon follow suit....

"'Clearly masks are important in health-care settings, we've used them always, and I've been a big supporter of mask wearing when it's appropriate,' Dr. Bonnie Henry, B.C. provincial health officer and chair of the council of chief medical officers of health, told CBC News. 'Nobody is telling you not to wear a mask, what we're saying is it's no longer mandatory by a provincial health officer order that everybody do it all the time.'

"Canadians can expect many areas of hospitals to still encourage masking in emergency rooms and departments with particularly vulnerable patients, like burn units and cancer wards — and health-care workers will still likely wear them in many patient-facing settings. 'If you want to or your provider wants to, masks will certainly be available. So I think it's going to be a gradual transition,' Dr. Saqib Shahab, Saskatchewan's chief medical health officer, told CBC Saskatchewan last week....

"Part of the reasoning behind the shift in policy is to remove the need for health-care workers, who have faced severe burnout throughout the pandemic, to constantly mask in every area of the hospital — while also still allowing them the freedom to continue to do so.... Dr. Alon Vaisman, an infection control physician at Toronto's University Health Network (UHN) and assistant medical professor at the University of Toronto, said removing universal mask mandates in all health-care settings would likely help to ease health-care worker burnout.... 

"Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease physician and senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security in Baltimore, said hospitals should be able to independently set policies on masking depending on local COVID levels and expert advice. 'When you're talking about non-patient facing activities, I don't think that there's much benefit in having masks in place, he said. 'There is benefit in patient-facing activities to having people wear masks, but I think it's something that each hospital needs to make a determination on based on the local metrics and not really something for the government to necessarily be involved in.'

"Alberta is still requiring masks in patient-facing settings, Quebec and Ontario are leaving masking rules up to individual hospitals, while Manitoba has opted to still require masks in health-care settings for the time being.... 

"Canada avoided a severe winter COVID-19 wave despite a lack of most of public health restrictions, a busy indoor holiday season and a rapidly mutating virus — largely thanks to high levels of hybrid immunity from vaccination and prior infection.... But COVID hospitalization levels still remain stubbornly high in Canada, with 3,268 hospital beds occupied by COVID patients across the country according to the latest federal data, despite continuing to gradually decline since mid-January."

Read more https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/mask-mandates-canada-hospitals-long-term-care-1.6811240

COVID-19 mask mandates dropped in more hospitals | CBC News, April 15, 2023:

Swiss no longer recommend Covid vaccination

Switzerland's Office of Public Health is not recommending Covid vaccination for spring and summer 2023, even for high-risk individuals. Those at especially high risk can still get the vaccine following a doctor's recommendation; others who wish to be vaccinated may do so at their own expense. 

Coronavirus: Vaccination | Federal Office of Public Health FOPH:

April 3, 2023 - "In principle, no COVID-19 vaccination is recommended for spring/summer 2023. People at especially high risk can receive a vaccination following an individual consultation with their doctor....

"Nearly everyone in Switzerland has been vaccinated and/or contracted and recovered from COVID-19. Their immune system has therefore been exposed to the coronavirus. In spring/summer 2023, the virus will likely circulate less. The current virus variants also cause rather mild illness. For autumn 2023, the vaccination recommendation will be evaluated again and adjusted accordingly....

Photo courtesy Fair Observer.

"[I]t is also not currently recommended for people at especially high risk to receive a COVID-19 vaccination. They can, however, receive a vaccination following an individual consultation with their doctor. Vaccination may be wise in individual cases, as it improves protection against developing severe COVID-19 for several months. This applies regardless of the number of vaccinations you have already received.

"People at especially high risk include:

• People aged 65 or over
• People aged 16 or over with a chronic condition
• People aged 16 or over with Down’s syndrome
• Pregnant women

"If a wave of infection were to emerge in spring/summer 2023, the vaccination recommendation would be adjusted....

"The COVID-19 vaccination can be given from 6 months after the last COVID-19 vaccination or from 6 months after a known coronavirus infection..... We advise you to get vaccinated with a bivalent (i.e. variant-adapted) mRNA vaccine or with the protein-based Novavax vaccine. Which vaccine(s) you have previously received is of no importance here.... If you are pregnant or breastfeeding, or if you have a severely weakened immune system, you should get yourself vaccinated with an mRNA vaccine....

"[N]o COVID-19 vaccination is recommended for spring/summer 2023. People who want to get vaccinated without a recommendation (e.g. for a trip) can get the vaccination but have to pay for it themselves....

"[If you are] someone at especially high risk, you can receive a vaccination following an individual consultation with your doctor. A vaccination recommended by your doctor is free of charge for you and is covered by compulsory health insurance."

Read more: https://www.bag.admin.ch/bag/en/home/krankheiten/ausbrueche-epidemien-pandemien/aktuelle-ausbrueche-epidemien/novel-cov/impfen.html

U.S. CDC overhauls Covid-19 guidelines

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control have drastically revised their COVID19 guidelines, dropping quarantine, mass testing, and  "Test to stay" in schools, and no longer discriminating between vaccinated and unvaccinated Americans.

CDC ends recommendations for social distancing and quarantine for Covid-19 control, no longer recommends test-to-stay in school | CNN - Brenda Goodman & Elizabeth Cohen:

August 11, 2022- "The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC] says the nation should move away from restrictive measures such as quarantines and social distancing and focus on reducing severe disease from Covid-19. In new guidelines released Thursday, the agency no longer recommends staying at least 6 feet away from other people to reduce the risk of exposure -- a shift from guidance that had been in place since the early days of the pandemic....

"'The current conditions of this pandemic are very different from those of the last two years,' Greta Massetti, who leads the Field Epidemiology and Prevention Branch at the CDC, said Thursday. 'High levels of population immunity due to vaccination and previous infection and the many available tools to protect the general population, and protect people at higher risk, allow us to focus on protecting people from serious illness from Covid-19.'

"The new CDC guidelines say contact tracing, another hallmark during the pandemic, should be limited to hospitals and certain high-risk group-living situations such as nursing homes, and the guidelines de-emphasize the use of regular testing to screen for Covid-19.... The new guidance also does not advise quarantining people who've been exposed to Covid-19 but are not infected.... 

"The changes are an acknowledgment that SARS-CoV-2 may be with us for the long haul. They aim to help people live their lives around Covid-19 with minimal disruptions to work and school. They are also more risk-based, advising people who are at higher risk for severe illness to take more personal precautions than others. 'I think they just overall come into alignment with what people are doing anyway,' says Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California at San Francisco.... He sees it as a move by the CDC to try to regain the public's trust. A recent survey from the Annenberg Public Policy Center shows that most Americans (54%) are no longer masking indoors, and about 4 in 10 say they've fully returned to their pre-pandemic routines -- up from 16% in January.... 

"The agency also puts more emphasis on improving ventilation. Aerosol scientists have long complained that the 6-foot social distancing guidance was arbitrary and unhelpful because the virus that causes Covid-19 can float through the air for greater distances.... In addition to vaccination, the CDC urges additional measures for people with suppressed immune function, including the use of Evusheld, a kind of passive immunity that's given before a person gets sick. It's especially helpful for people who can't mount an immune response, and experts say it has been underutilized in this country....

"The agency removed the recommendation that kids in different classrooms avoid mixing, a practice known as cohorting. It also removed advice that kids who are contacts of someone who tested positive for Covid-19 take regular tests – and test negative – to remain in the classroom, which was known as test-to-stay.... Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, one of the nation's largest teachers unions, said the new guidelines were welcome news for schools."
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/11/health/cdc-covid-guidance-update/index.html

CDC Quietly Ends Differentiation on Covid Vaccination Status | Brownstone Institute - Michael Senger: 

August 12, 2002 - Today, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) quietly ended its policy of differentiating within COVID-19 prevention guidance between those who have received Covid vaccines and those who have not.... As explained by the CDC’s Greta Massetti, lead author of the new guidance: "Both prior infection and vaccination confer some protection against severe illness, and so it really makes the most sense to not differentiate with our guidance or our recommendations based on vaccination status at this time.'"
Read more: https://brownstone.org/articles/cdc-quietly-ends-differentiation-on-covid-vaccination-status/

Natural immunity outperfoms 3 Covid shots

Natural Immunity Offered More Protection Against Omicron Than 3 Vaccine Doses, New England Journal of Medicine Study Finds | Foundation for Economic Education - Jon Miltimore:

July 18, 2022 - News reports say the Biden administration is currently weighing a plan that would allow all adults to receive a second Covid-19 booster, citing concerns from White House chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci about the spike in hospitalizations 'fueled by the extremely contagious omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5.' Currently second booster shots are only offered to individuals over the age of 50. Meanwhile, discussion of a potential fifth shot is already underway.... 

The discussions highlight certain realities of Covid immunization. 'Immunity wanes,' Fauci said during a White House briefing on Tuesday, 'whether that’s immunity following infection or immunity following vaccine.' 

While it’s true that immunization wanes, new scientific research from The New England Journal of Medicine suggests natural immunity lasts longer than immunity acquired from vaccines.

The study, a case–control analysis based on data from Qatar collected from December 23, 2021 through February 21, 2022, involved millions of people, including 1,306,862 who received at least two doses of the Pfizer vaccine (BNT162b2) and 893,671 people who received at least two doses of the Moderna vaccine (mRNA-1273), as well unvaccinated individuals. The results of the study are a mixed bag for the vaccines.

The best news is that 'any form of previous immunity, whether induced by previous infection or vaccination, is associated with strong and durable protection against Covid-19–related hospitalization and death'.... Also good news is that both the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines 'enhanced protection among persons who had had a previous infection.... The combination of prior, full vaccination and prior infection was maximally protective,' researchers said in a summary of the study’s findings released last month by the Weill Cornell Medicine Newsroom. 'Individuals with prior infection and three doses of either mRNA vaccine were, overall, nearly 80 percent protected from symptomatic infection during the omicron wave.'

But the study also found that two doses of vaccines offered 'negligible' protection against Omicron infection. 'A key finding was that a history of vaccination with the standard two doses of either the Pfizer or Moderna mRNA vaccine, but no history of prior infection, brought no significant protection against symptomatic omicron infection,' researchers said.

In regards to the Pfizer vaccine, three shots offered considerably more protection. But the protection was still lower than natural immunity, which offered stronger and more sustained protection from infection than vaccination. (Researchers noted that 'people with a prior-variant infection were moderately protected from omicron with little decline in protection even a year after their prior infection.')

The findings are not unlike those out of Israel published last year, which found that natural immunity offered more robust protection against the Delta variant than vaccines. 'The natural immune protection that develops after a SARS-CoV-2 infection offers considerably more of a shield against the Delta variant of the pandemic coronavirus than two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine,' Science reported in August 2021 in a piece exploring the Israel findings.

More than a dozen other studies [have] also found that natural immunity offered powerful protection against Covid, equal to or stronger than vaccination. Even absent these findings, vaccine mandates were dubious from the beginning. The morality of violating bodily autonomy through government coercion is a serious and dangerous matter. In light of these findings, however, vaccine mandates also appear nonsensical.

While many institutions now consider Covid infection a form of immunization — including the NCAA, which in January changed its policy to accommodate athletes who’d had Covid — many have not. Thousands of soldiers have been discharged because of their vaccination status. Healthcare workers continue to face vaccination mandates in many places.

It’s time for all institutions — especially governments—to recognize vaccination choices should remain with individuals. The idea that freedom over one’s own body is the most basic and essential freedom is one embraced not just by libertarians like Ron Paul but by international leaders like Natalia Kanem, a physician who leads the United Nations Population Fund. 'Bodily autonomy is the foundation on which all rights exist,' Kanem bluntly states.

All efforts to compel people to get vaccinated (or else) are coercive, and therefore wrong. But when the government, in particular, violates bodily autonomy for an alleged greater good, it betrays its very reason for being. 'The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man’s rights,' the philosopher Ayn Rand noted.

As more studies like the research published by The New England Journal of Medicine come out, it becomes more and more clear that vaccine mandates were not just immoral. They were senseless. Fortunately, many are beginning to realize just that.

Read more: https://fee.org/articles/natural-immunity-offered-more-protection-against-omicron-than-3-vaccine-doses-new-england-journal-of-medicine-study-finds/

Read study: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2203965

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

"Little or no" vax protection against Omicron BA.5

COVID-19 infection before 2022 offers little protection against Omicron, study finds | CP24 - Chris Herhalt:

July 12, 2002 - Vaccination or recovery from a COVID-19 infection prior to 2022 provides little or no protection from getting infected again in the Omicron era, a new study completed largely by Toronto researchers found.

"The group used blood samples from hospitalized COVID-19 patients to develop a new modular, adaptable blood test known as NEU-SATiN. They compared it to several other more expensive, slower, established tests and found it could accurately detect the concentration of neutralizing antibodies in blood, regardless of which variant the patient was infected with, in 30 minutes or less. But it showed the antibodies generated from vaccination or recovery from Alpha or Delta variants circulating prior to 2022 barely register against Omicron.

"'What it says if you had a natural infection or were vaccinated, you are likely protected against the variant you had,' study contributor Dr. Shawn Owen from the University of Utah told CP24. 'But what it also says is that it doesn’t give you protection either way for later strains, especially the Omicron variant.'

"The test could detect medically significant levels of neutralizing antibodies in vaccinated or recovered patients, even more than fifty days after receipt of their last dose. Researchers took those samples and compared them to samples of Omicron-infected patients collected later on and found 'almost all samples' of blood from infected patients 'were ineffective at neutralizing the Omicron variants.... Our results also suggest that prior infection/vaccination does not provide significant neutralizing protection against the (Omicron) variant,' study authors wrote.

Graphs courtesy Nature

"The new test detects the level of neutralizing antibodies developed against SARS-COV-2 post-infection, using commonly available lab implements, and it can be adjusted to detect each new variant that emerges. Owen said the test is built in such a way that one can make a new version of it for 'each one of the variants” that emerges and becomes dominant.

He said that the study also found that there are advantages to acquiring immunity, even for a short period of time, through vaccination rather than recovery from infection. 'It also says that you can get protection from becoming infected but you’re going to get sick in order to do that. So a vaccine is probably a better choice to avoid that and get the same protection.'

"Even with the study’s findings, infectious diseases specialist Dr. Isaac Bogoch says that neutralizing antibodies are only one part of the body’s immune system. 'We’ve got multiple arms and multiple branches of our immune system to protect us against COVID-19, especially in those people who are vaccinated and up to date with their vaccination and of course even in people who have been infected and have recovered from infection, so it’s not like this puts us back to square one whatsoever”

"Ontario health officials have said that the BA.5 Omicron subvariant, which is believed to be even more infectious than previous strains, now accounts for more than 60 per cent of all infections in the province and is driving a new wave of the pandemic."

Read more: https://www.cp24.com/news/covid-19-infection-before-2022-offers-little-protection-against-omicron-study-finds-1.5984158

Read study: nature.com/articles/s41467-022-31300-9

Scientists develop test to measure T-cell immunity

How strong is your Covid immunity? A blood test could offer some insight | NBC News - Denise Chow:

June 14, 2022 - "A newly developed blood test that measures a specific immune response in the body could help doctors gauge how much protection a person has against Covid-19, according to a new study. The test, which focuses on the part of the immune system that confers long-term protection by prompting the body to 'remember' the virus, could help make sense of the complex tangle of Covid immunity that now exists from person to person.

"The test can, for instance, measure immunity regardless of whether someone has developed a level of protection from one or more natural infections ["natural immunity"] or from vaccinations and booster shots. Others, who may have much lower levels of protection because they are immunocompromised, could also use the test to assess their vulnerability and see how they responded to the vaccines, said Ernesto Guccione, an associate professor of oncological sciences and pharmacological sciences at the Tisch Cancer Institute at Mount Sinai. 'Ideally, it will give you a full picture of where you stand and a comprehensive picture of your immune protection,' said Guccione, one of the authors of the study published Monday in the journal Nature Biotechnology....

"The test involves taking a small blood sample at a clinic and mixing it with snippets of proteins from the virus. Researchers then look to see if the so-called T cells are activated in the sample. T cells are the cornerstone of the immune system's long-term memory and typically lie in wait until they detect the presence of foreign invaders. Unlike antibody levels, which can wane following vaccinations or infections, T cells can recall a virus years, and sometimes decades, later.... T cells are primed to 'recall' fragments of a virus, including from variants that can dodge protective antibodies.... T cells won't stop an infection from happening, but they can prevent a patient from becoming severely ill from Covid. 

"Previous studies have found that T cells can recognize all the known variants of concern, including omicron, but Guccione said it's an active area of research.... Tests to detect T cells have mostly been limited to labs for research purposes, and the process is usually expensive and difficult to do on a large scale, Guccione said. The new kit, however, is designed to be used widely, and results can typically be delivered in less than 24 hours, he added.... 

"Currently, the test can detect the activation of T cells, but the researchers are hoping that subsequent versions may be able to provide more granular detail, said Jordi Ochando, an assistant professor of oncological sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and one of the study co-authors.... Future iterations may, for example, be able to provide details on the magnitude and the duration of a person's immunity to Covid. Each test costs roughly $50 to run, but Ochando said it's possible that companies that license the product could include a markup on the price.

"The test was developed by researchers at Mount Sinai and the Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore. It is commercially available in Europe, as part of a licensing agreement with Hyris, a biotechnology company based in the United Kingdom."

Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/much-covid-immunity-figuring-crucial-complicated-rcna13774

Read study: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41587-022-01347-6

WHO calls China's ZeroCovid policy unsustainable

WHO offers rare criticism for China's steadfast and strict COVID-19 measures | CBC News - Thompson Reuters: 

May 10, 2022 - "The head of the World Health Organization [WHO] said on Tuesday China's zero-tolerance COVID-19 policy is not sustainable given what is known of the disease, in rare public comments by the United Nations agency on a government's handling of the virus. 'We don't think that it is sustainable considering the behaviour of the virus,' WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a media briefing.

"Speaking after Tedros, WHO emergencies director Mike Ryan said the impact of a 'zero-COVID' policy on human rights also needs to be taken into consideration alongside the effect on a country's economy. He also noted that China has registered 15,000 deaths since the virus first emerged in the city of Wuhan in late 2019 — a relatively low number compared with 999,475 in the United States and more than 500,000 in India. With that in mind, it is understandable that one of the world's most populous countries would want to take tough measures to curb coronavirus contagion, Ryan said.

"WHO guidelines have never recommended mass screening of asymptomatic individuals — as is currently happening in China — because of the costs involved and the lack of data on its effectiveness. China's zero-COVID-19 policy has drawn criticism ranging from scientists to its own citizens, leading to a cycle of lockdowns of many millions of people. Under the policy, authorities lock down large population areas to stamp out viral spread in response to any coronavirus outbreak, even if just a small number of people test positive. 

"Shanghai, with a population of 25 million, was enduring its sixth week of a city-wide lockdown. Shanghai's measures have been particularly strict, with residents allowed out of compounds only for exceptional reasons, such as a medical emergency. Many are not even allowed out of their front doors to mingle with neighbours. Its quarantine policy has also been criticized for separating children from parents and putting asymptomatic cases among those with symptoms....

"China has been hampered by the fact its strict pandemic-long approach left the population with little acquired immunity through infection, with the highly transmissible Omicron variants spurring infections. In a contrast to what has been seen in most developed nations, the working age population has had higher rates of vaccination than the generally more vulnerable cohorts of seniors. The approach its taking a heavy toll on the world's second largest economy, with significant knock-on impacts on global trade and supply chains. China's export growth slowed to its weakest in almost two years, data showed on Monday. Unemployment was also near two-year highs."

Read more: https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/china-covid-19-who-1.6447833

WHO chief censored on China’s internet after calling zero-Covid unsustainable | CNN - Nectar Gan

May 11, 2022 - "The criticism from Tedros, who was accused of being too close to China earlier in the pandemic, came just days after Chinese leader Xi Jinping vowed to double down on the policy and 'resolutely struggle' against all critics. The United Nation’s official press account on China’s Twitter-like Weibo posted Tedro’s comments early on Wednesday morning, drawing a wave of sarcastic comments from Chinese users.

“'Resolutely fight against any words and acts that distort, doubt or deny our country’s epidemic prevention and control policies! Down with the World Health Organization!' a top reply said. 'Should the UN’s verified account be blocked this time?' another said. By mid-morning, the post was no longer viewable on Weibo 'due to the author’s privacy setting'.... A Weibo hashtag of Tedros’ name has also been censored, with images featuring his face being scrubbed from the platform, though posts containing his name are still visible.

"On WeChat, an article from the UN’s official account that included Tedros’ comments has been 'banned from sharing due to a violation of relevant laws and regulations' as of Wednesday morning. Video clips of Tedros’ speech have also been removed from the platform.

"Tedros’ comments, though in line with the assessment of most scientists, have also drawn the ire of Beijing.... 'We hope relevant people can view China’s epidemic prevention and control policy in an objective and rational way, learn more about the facts and refrain from making irresponsible remarks,' Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian said at a news briefing Wednesday."

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/11/china/who-china-zero-covid-unsustainable-intl-hnk/index.html

US CDC burying data on natural immunity

How the CDC Buries the Truth about Natural Immunity | Brownstone Institute - Joe Wang:

March 30, 2022 - "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is one of the U.S. government’s major operating components, an agency under the Department of Health and Human Services. The CDC’s mission statement reads, 'CDC increases the health security of our nation. … CDC saves lives and protects people from health threats.' The agency also pledges to the American people that it will 'base all public health decisions on the highest quality scientific data that is derived openly and objectively.'

"Well, COVID-19 has been the nation’s largest health threat for the past two years. It has had a huge impact on the lives of every American. During those two years, thousands of scientists and health-care researchers have studied COVID and accumulated a huge amount of information on the disease. We’ve now gradually come to realize that the most effective force that would eventually end the pandemic is natural immunity. Even Bill Gates has admitted that 'the virus itself, particularly the variant called Omicron, is a type of vaccine.' With the rapid spread of Omicron and with many asymptomatic infections, millions of people have developed natural immunity, which is driving COVID-19 out of its pandemic stage and into endemicity....

"The CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) published on Jan. 28 presented some very interesting information from California and New York comparing immunity against COVID-19 from four groups of people, indicating natural immunity alone provides the best protection. Since then, I have been anxiously waiting for more data, as there are 48 other states, and even for California and New York, important data like this should be updated monthly, if not weekly. To my surprise and disappointment, I have not been able to find any more data on natural immunity from the MMWR since Jan. 28. I am sure they have the data — they just don’t want to share it with us. I’m beginning to wonder if CDC stands for Center for Data Control....

"The CDC’s Jan. 28 report included the following chart but neglected to provide a summary comparing protection between vaccinated people without natural immunity and unvaccinated people who recovered from COVID and now have natural immunity. It seems that it’s necessary to dive a little deeper into the data to elaborate my point, as the authors of the report did not conclude the very obvious. Please bear with me.

"The above CDC chart shows data from California on protection against COVID-19 collected from four groups of people between May 30, 2021, and Nov. 20, 2021:

1. The unvaccinated, with no previous COVID-19 diagnosis (top solid line)
2. The vaccinated, with no previous COVID-19 diagnosis ([blue] broken line below the solid line)
3. The unvaccinated, with previous diagnosis [black broken line]
4. The vaccinated, with previous diagnosis [blue dotted line]

"It is obvious that the lines representing 3) and 4) are superimposing on one another, indicating that vaccination had virtually no impact on protection when a person has recovered from COVID-19 infection, meaning natural immunity dominates protection over vaccination to a level that made vaccination irrelevant.

"Although the biggest difference lies between the unvaccinated with no previous infection and everyone else, the second biggest difference, however, is between the 'Vaccinated, no previous COVID-19 diagnosis' line (vaccine immunity) and the 'Unvaccinated, previous COVID-19 diagnosis' line (natural immunity), with the natural immunity line having a much lower hazard rate, meaning better protection.  The report also revealed similar findings for New York state.

"The CDC’s MMWR is a weekly report. The chart above is part of the report for the last week of January, and it was for only two of the 50 states, California and New York. When I was writing my Feb. 5 article, I thought that maybe it was a benign omission that the CDC did not conclude the obvious. For sure, more data would be coming from the CDC in February and March, I thought, as it would teach us so much more about natural immunity.

"However, it hasn’t materialized. Since Jan. 28, there have been 10 MMWR reports published on the CDC website, totaling 29 articles in all. They cover topics ranging from vaccination by geographic locations, to vaccine confidence by sexual orientation, to isolation strategy for fully vaccinated NFL players, and so on. So far, the Jan. 28 report was the only one that included 'unvaccinated, with previous diagnosis' in the data, and that’s unfortunate. All the other reports were to re-enforce the conclusion that vaccines are effective, with almost nothing about natural immunity.... 

"According to the CDC’s own information, the United States has had about 80 million COVID-19 cases. The vast majority of patients recovered from the disease. This huge part of the U.S. population now enjoys natural immunity. This is also true for Canada and many other parts of the world.

"It seems that the CDC is avoiding anything and everything related to natural immunity. But why?"

Read more: https://brownstone.org/articles/how-the-cdc-buries-the-truth-about-natural-immunity/

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Bill Gates: Omicron variant immunizing the world

Pandemic Lessons Learned: Omicron Versus Bill Gates | Epoch Times - Joe Wang:

February 26, 2022 - "At the Munich Security Conference on Feb. 18, Bill Gates was asked to assess where we are at in beating the pandemic. He replied: 'Sadly, the virus itself, particularly the variant called Omicron, is a type of vaccine. That is, it creates both B-cell and T-cell immunity.' Maybe Mr. Gates read my Jan. 5 opinion piece, 'Omicron May Help End the Pandemic This Winter'? I’m glad he agrees with me that Omicron is like an effective vaccine that is helping end the pandemic. As a veteran vaccine scientist who spearheaded a vaccine project in 2003 against the original SARS, I was quite confident projecting where Omicron would lead the pandemic, given its characteristics after it emerged late last year. But knowing that the world’s most famous influencer looks at it the same way is quite satisfying. 

"But why did Mr. Gates say 'sadly'? I have to admit that I wrote my article with mixed emotions. On one hand, I was delighted because I knew that after two long years, Omicron could provide a way out of the pandemic. On the other, it was still relatively virulent and many people could die as it swept through the world. Maybe Mr. Gates, whose foundation funded the development and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines around the world, was sad because of any deaths that occurred? It doesn’t appear so, as he continued, '[Omicron] has done a better job getting out to the world population than we have with vaccines. … That means the chance of severe disease — which is mainly associated with being elderly and having obesity or diabetes — those risks are now dramatically reduced because of that infection exposure.'

"Since reduced risk is good for humanity and something to be desired, what is there to be sad about? Was Gates sad because Omicron beat the vaccines in generating protective immunity, thereby preventing the ability of COVID to spread — meaning there would be no need for any future COVID vaccines? If vaccines achieve sterilizing immunity, great. If not, and instead naturally occurring Omicron brings an end to the pandemic, equally great. It’s not a competition, it’s whatever gets the job done — that is, unless you value the success of vaccines more than ending the pandemic.

"Almost from the beginning of the pandemic, we were told that the only way out was via vaccination. Vaccines were rapidly developed and the emergency use of them was pushed out. There were vaccine drives and clinics, and before long boosters became part of the scenario. Then came vaccine mandates, even for people who had acquired natural immunity, followed by vaccination of children.... All along it has been all about vaccines, and less about the disease. As a former vaccine scientist, I should be happy that vaccines have taken the center stage in the world. But I am not, as I am clear that vaccines are not the goal — they are merely the means to help humanity overcome the pandemic. The means should never become the goal.

"When it turned out that vaccination failed to defeat COVID and [the pandemic] was instead conquered by Omicron, Mr. Gates found it sad. Humans missed a great opportunity to show that we are the true masters of the world.

"Human history is a history of survival in harsh, natural conditions. Some in their efforts to survive discovered how to live in peace and harmony with nature, while others who fought and won regarded themselves as triumphant against nature. Mao Zedong famously said, 'It is so rewarding (with endless joy) to fight against heaven, against earth, and against people.' According to Mao and his comrades, when dealing with natural disasters, humans must win, and win decisively, through cleverness and persistence. It would not be a complete win if humans got help from nature, which would instead bring shame to all involved. When I grew up in communist China I believed that, guided by Mao’s teachings, science and technological advancement could provide solutions for all the problems humanity could possibly face.... 

"As a young man brainwashed by the doctrine of communism, I dreamt of engineering genes to solve all the world’s problems, such as diseases, food shortages, environmental disasters, etc. I thought that since nature caused so much trouble for humans, it was up to geneticists like myself to change nature by engineering the genes of all creatures to be exactly what we humans would like them to be. Call it arrogance, naiveté, or stupidity, that was what I believed, as did millions of other young people in communist China at that time....

"It was actually after I came to Canada that I found my roots in traditional Chinese culture. The idea that man and nature are one harmonious body, as ancient Chinese believed, makes more sense than the fighting mentality the communist system taught me. I have learned to appreciate nature and accept whatever it has in store for me. When outbreaks of infectious diseases occur, we should find ways to cope with them, as humans have done for thousands of years. Today, we have advanced technologies to better navigate the situation, as well as vaccines and therapeutics. But we should also try meditation and other holistic approaches to improve our immune system and seek harmony with our surroundings.

"It seems that Mr. Gates and many others of his ilk have not yet found peace with nature. Using their money and power, they want to achieve a complete win in a war against nature. My advice to Mr. Gates, for a better approach, is that humans work in tandem with nature and find harmony with nature. Do not pick fights with nature. We may win a fight here and there, but we will never win in a war against nature. Omicron has played a decisive part in assisting human efforts to end the pandemic, so be grateful, thank Mother Nature for the gift, and happily move on."

Read more: https://www.theepochtimes.com/pandemic-lessons-learned-omicron-vs-bill-gates_4302529.html

Israeli data shows vitamin D efficacy vs Covid

Israeli study offers strongest proof yet of vitamin D’s power to fight COVID | Times of Israel - Nathan Jaffay:

3 February 3, 2022 - "Israel scientists say they have gathered the most convincing evidence to date that increased vitamin D levels can help COVID-19 patients reduce the risk of serious illness or death. Researchers from Bar Ilan University and the Galilee Medical Center say that the vitamin has such a strong impact on disease severity that they can predict how people would fare if infected based on nothing more than their ages and vitamin D levels.

"Lacking vitamin D significantly increases danger levels, they concluded in newly peer-reviewed research published Thursday in the journal PLOS One. The study is based on research conducted during Israel’s first two waves of the virus, before vaccines were widely available, and doctors emphasized that vitamin supplements were not a substitute for vaccines, but rather a way to keep immunity levels from falling.

"Vitamin D deficiency is endemic across the Middle East, including in Israel, where nearly four in five people are low on the vitamin, according to one study from 2011. By taking supplements before infection, though, the researchers in the new Israeli study found that patients could avoid the worst effects of the disease.

"'We found it remarkable, and striking, to see the difference in the chances of becoming a severe patient when you are lacking in vitamin D compared to when you’re not,' said Dr. Amiel Dror, a Galilee Medical Center physician and Bar Ilan researcher who was part of the team behind the study. He noted that his study was conducted pre-Omicron, but said that the coronavirus doesn’t change fundamentally enough between variants to negate vitamin D effectiveness. 'What we’re seeing when vitamin D helps people with COVID infections is a result of its effectiveness in bolstering the immune systems to deal with viral pathogens that attack the respiratory system,' he told The Times of Israel. 'This is equally relevant for Omicron as it was for previous variants.'

"Health authorities in Israel and several other countries have recommended vitamin D supplements in response to the coronavirus pandemic, though data on its effectiveness has been sparse until now. In June, researchers published preliminary findings showing that 26 percent of coronavirus patients died if they were vitamin D deficient soon before hospitalization, compared to 3% who had normal levels of vitamin D. They also determined that hospitalized patients who were vitamin D deficient were 14 times more likely, on average, to end up in severe or critical condition than others. 

"While the scientific community recognized the importance of the results, questions arose as to whether recent health conditions among the patients might have been skewing the results. The possibility was raised that patients could have been suffering from conditions that both reduce vitamin D levels and increase vulnerability to serious illness from COVID-19, meaning the vitamin deficiency would be a symptom rather than a contributing factor in disease severity.

"To zero out that possibility, Dror’s team delved deeper into the data, examining each of its patients’ vitamin D levels over the two-year stretch before coronavirus infection. They found that the strong correlation between sufficient vitamin D levels and ability to fight the coronavirus still held, and the level of increased danger in their preliminary findings remained almost identical....

"A flood of dubious claims about natural remedies to the coronavirus, including a theory that Israelis had immunized themselves with lemons and baking soda, have left some skeptical about claims of vitamins warding off the virus. But Dror insisted that his team’s research showed that the importance of vitamin D was not based on incomplete or flawed data. 'People should learn from this that studies pointing to the importance of taking vitamin D are very reliable, and aren’t based on skewed data,' he said. 'And it emphasizes the value of everyone taking a vitamin D supplement during the pandemic, which, consumed in sensible amounts in accordance with official advice, doesn’t have any downside.'"

Read more: https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-study-offers-strongest-proof-yet-of-vitamin-ds-power-to-fight-covid/ 

Read study: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0263069

Ireland and Iceland ending Covid restrictions

Ireland Scraps COVID Restrictions, Becoming the Most Travel-Friendly Country in the E.U. | Inside Hook - Lindsay Rogers:

January 24, 2022 - "In a televised address on Friday, Prime Minister Micheal Martin announced that — per the advice of public health officials — bars and restaurants would no longer need to close at 8 p.m. or to ask customers for proof of vaccination, and all venues, both indoor and outdoor, would be able to return to full capacity, effective Saturday.... [P]eople will still be expected to wear face coverings on public transport and in shops, but only until the end of February....

"This comes on the heels of the country’s decision to drop the testing requirement for vaccinated travelers at the start of the new year, meaning it’s currently one of the easiest countries to visit. And ... with pubs being able to operate at full capacity and not adhere to a curfew, all signs point to Ireland being able to properly celebrate St. Patrick’s Day for the first time since before the pandemic, when an estimated two million people gathered to attend parades and festivals nationwide.

"The latest series of changes also align Ireland with Northern Ireland where COVID rules are involved, with the latter loosening restrictions and dropping vaccine passes on Thursday. Northern Ireland is also set to reopen nightclubs next week."
Read more: https://www.insidehook.com/daily_brief/travel/ireland-scraps-covid-restrictions

Ireland drops most of its remaining COVID restrictions | Saltwire - Graham Fahy, Reuters:

February 22, 2022 - "Ireland on Tuesday said it will drop most of its remaining pandemic-linked restrictions from Feb. 28 as an Omicron-fuelled wave of infections ebbs.... People will no longer be legally required to wear masks, physical distancing measures in schools will end, and the national testing and tracing program will be scaled back. Government advice that masks should be worn on public transport and in healthcare settings will remain."
Read more:  https://www.saltwire.com/atlantic-canada/news/ireland-drops-most-of-its-remaining-covid-restrictions-100696551/

Iceland Lifts Several National COVID-19 Rules Including Quarantine Requirement | Schwengen News:

February 12, 2022 - "According to a press release issued by Iceland’s Ministry of Health yesterday, on February 12, persons who are already in self-isolation do not need to undergo COVID-19 testing in order to end their quarantine period.... In addition, the same has revealed that citizens of Iceland who have been exposed to the virus will no longer be required to undergo testing.... While the authorities have emphasised that the entry rules will remain unchanged for incoming travellers, they have announced that less stringent national COVID-19 restrictions will now apply within the country.

"Starting from today, the number of people allowed in indoor areas during the same time will be increased to 200. Previously, there was a limit of 50 persons. On the other hand, limitations in the number of persons for outdoor areas will be removed. Similarly, stores will no longer have restrictions in place when it comes to the number of people that are allowed access.

"Crowded events with up to 1,000 persons will also now be allowed, provided that everyone is seated and wears a mask. Regarding the requirement to wear a mask while in outdoor and indoor public areas, the Ministry has explained that citizens of the country, as well as travellers, will be required to follow this requirement only if the one-meter-distance rules can not be followed."
Read more: https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/news/iceland-lifts-several-national-covid-19-rules-including-quarantine-requirement/

Iceland to lift all COVID-19 restrictions on Friday | Reuters:

February 23, 2022 - "Iceland will lift all remaining COVID-19 restrictions on Friday, including a 200-person indoor gathering limit and restricted opening hours for bars, the Ministry of Health said on Wednesday. 'Widespread societal resistance to COVID-19 is the main route out of the epidemic,' the ministry said in a statement, citing infectious disease authorities. 'To achieve this, as many people as possible need to be infected with the virus as the vaccines are not enough, even though they provide good protection against serious illness,' it added. All border restrictions would also be lifted, it said." [stress added]
Read more: https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/iceland-lift-all-covid-19-restrictions-friday-media-reports-2022-02-23/

Colds can protect against Covid, study finds

COVID Quickly, Episode 21: Colds Build COVID Immunity, and the Omicron Vaccine Delay | Scientific American - Josh Fischman & Jeffery DelViscio, 60-second Science (transcript):

January 19, 2022 - "From early in the pandemic, its been clear that not everyone is equally vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID. Some people get really sick, while others have mild symptoms or none at all. And this was true before any of us were protected by vaccines. Overall about 80 percent of infected people get a mild illness. The virus is so wildly infectious, though, that the 20 percent of serious cases have been a global catastrophe. 

"But in people who don’t get very ill — what’s protecting them? We hear a lot about neutralizing antibodies, but this is a new virus to us. You don’t get antibodies until after you’ve been exposed or vaccinated.  

"It turns out some people might be getting help from another part of the immune system — T-cells, which were triggered years ago by exposure to different but related coronaviruses. These microbes have been with us forever, and they cause sneezing and runny noses: the common cold. The cold coronavirus and the pandemic coronavirus are distantly related. But they do share similar proteins. Early in the pandemic, scientists noticed that T-cells that reacted to the cold virus also reacted to the pandemic virus. These are called cross-reactive T-cells. But since researchers saw this in test tubes, they had no idea what this meant for immunity in real life. 

"Ajit Lalvani, an infectious disease physician at Imperial College London, decided to find out. England has a really good contact tracing system. It allowed Lalvani and his colleagues to find 52 people who lived with individuals who tested positive for COVID. These 52 started out negative themselves. Within about 3 days, half of that group, or 26, turned positive. The other 26 stayed negative.

"Taking a closer look at the negative people, who didn’t get COVID, Lalvani’s team found that 7 of them had a lot of these cross-reactive T-cells. None of the people who got COVID had such cells. Zero. Lalvani told me this is a very substantial protective effect, and his team just published the results in the journal Nature Communications. The T cells, primed by the older cold virus, recognize the new pandemic virus because it has those similar proteins, and they work to fight it off.

"Immunologist Alex Sette, from the La Jolla Institute for Immunology, told me he thinks this research is on the right track. Other studies have linked recent exposure to these cold viruses with less severe COVID, says Sette, who was not involved in Lalvani’s work. Research has also tied pre-existing T-cells to a stronger immune response to a COVID vaccine....

"T-cells ... point to new targets to add to second-generation vaccines. The proteins these T-cells reacted to went beyond the well-known spike protein at the heart of the first-gen shots. The cells respond to other proteins called N and O-R-F, for instance. Adding those to a new vaccine formula, both Lalvani and Sette suggest, could widen the protection of vaccines against variants.;;; 

"A few companies have such 'T-cell enhanced' vaccines in the works. Gritstone and ImmunityBio, biotech firms in California ... have started clinical trials.  Including more of these proteins in a shot could create a vaccine capable of boosting your immunity against whatever variant comes along."

Read more: https://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/covid-quickly-episode-21-colds-build-covid-immunity-and-the-omicron-vaccine-delay/ 

Read study: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-27674-x

Pfizer vax efficacy vs. Omicron drops below zero, new studies show

As Three More Studies Show Negative Vaccine Effectiveness, When Will Health Authorities Face Up to What the Data is Telling Us? | Daily Sceptic - Will Jones: 

December 28, 2021 - "The last two weeks have brought three new studies finding negative efficacy for two vaccine doses, meaning the vaccinated are more likely to be infected than the unvaccinated. These are study findings, not raw data, so have been adjusted for various biases and confounders, making it harder to dismiss them as anomalous or skewed.

"The first is a pre-print study from Denmark, published on December 23rd, which looked at nearly all PCR-positive SARS-CoV-2 infections in Denmark from November 20th to December 12th and investigated them to see if they were likely to be the Omicron variant. By comparing the vaccination status of those infected, the researchers found a vaccine effectiveness against the Omicron variant of minus-76.5% for Pfizer and minus-39.3% for Moderna three months after double vaccination (see chart above), meaning the double-vaccinated were considerably more likely to be infected than the unvaccinated. They found the vaccine effectiveness against Omicron was significantly lower than against Delta, with Pfizer vaccine effectiveness at 53.8% and Moderna at 65% against Delta after three months. They reported that a third dose of Pfizer got vaccine effectiveness against Omicron back up to 54.6%, at least for a month. The full results are in the table below.

Hansen et al.

"The latest vaccine effectiveness study from the UKHSA confirms these results. Against Omicron, the UKHSA reports zero or negative vaccine effectiveness from a double-dose of all three vaccines (AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Moderna) after five months. The third dose takes it up again, but only into the 40-60% range, and dropping fast.

Pfizer

"A new study in Eurosurveillance from Norway also backs up the observation of negative vaccine effectiveness against Omicron, with a higher proportion of those who tested positive in the particular outbreak in the study being double-vaccinated than those who did not test positive (98% versus 93%)....

"With Omicron, the reports of negative efficacy are becoming impossible to ignore, with even the UKHSA publishing graphs showing it after three months on two doses. At some point, health authorities are going to need to grapple with what the data is showing on this and stop pretending it isn’t there."

Read more: https://dailysceptic.org/2021/12/28/as-three-more-studies-show-negative-vaccine-effectiveness-when-will-health-authorities-face-up-to-what-the-data-is-telling-us/

Read studies: 

Hansen et al.: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.20.21267966v3.full
UKHSA: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1043608/Vaccine_surveillance_report_-_week_51.pdf 
Eurosurveillance: https://www.eurosurveillance.org/content/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2021.26.50.2101147#html_fulltext

Natural immunity outperforms Pfizer in new study

Another Study Finds That Natural Immunity Protects Better Against Infection Than the Pfizer Vaccine | Daily Sceptic - Noah Carl:

December 10, 2021 - At the end of August, a study was published showing that natural immunity provides much better protection against infection than the Pfizer vaccine. It was described by  UCL[University College London]'s Francois Balloux as 'a bit of a bombshell'.... However, as I noted in my write-up of the 'bombshell' study, its findings still needed to be replicated. After all, certain datasets or methods of analysis can sometimes yield quirky results, which don’t survive independent empirical tests. Encouragingly, the findings now have been replicated – by another team of Israeli researchers, using a different dataset.

"In the latest study, Yair Goldberg and colleagues tracked all the individuals in their dataset (of people in Israel) who had tested positive or received two doses of the Pfizer vaccine before 1st July, 2021. They then compared the number of infections in previously infected versus vaccinated individuals from August to September of 2021. The researchers also examined the number of infections among those with so-called ‘hybrid immunity’ – i.e., previously infected individuals who got vaccinated.  

"For each of the three groups, they counted the number of infections and the number of days ‘at risk’ (i.e., the total number of people multiplied by the number of days on which they were ‘at risk’ of becoming infected). Adjustments were made for age, sex, ethnicity, calendar week and a measure of risk exposure.

"Results are shown in the chart below. Each bar corresponds to the infection rate per 100,000 ‘risk days’. The reason the researchers used ‘risk days’, rather than just ‘people’, is that the composition of each group changed over time. For example, some previously infected people chose to get vaccinated.

"Notice that the labels for the horizontal bars are not the same for each group. Since we want to compare apples with apples, look at the bars labelled 'Recovered 6–8 months' and 'Vaccinated 6–8 months'.... 6–8 months after the corresponding event, infection rates were more than six times higher among vaccinated individuals – 89 per 100,000 versus only 14 per 100,000 among previously infected individuals.

"The chart also shows that infection rates were lower still among those with hybrid immunity, which is consistent with what the earlier study found. However, the difference between the hybrid group and the recovered group was relatively small. For example, infection rates at 6–8 months were only 20% higher in the recovered group.

"Goldberg and colleagues’ study confirms that natural immunity does wane, though much more slowly than vaccine-induced immunity. Anyone claiming the contrary now has to contend with not one, but two, high quality studies."

Read more: https://dailysceptic.org/2021/12/10/another-study-finds-that-natural-immunity-protects-better-against-infection-than-the-pfizer-vaccine/ 

Read study: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.04.21267114v1
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.24.21262415

Natural immunity should be legally recognized, say some lawmakers and doctors

GOP embraces natural immunity as substitute for vaccines | Denver Post - Anthony Izauirre, Associated Press: 

Illustration: Chad Crowe, Wall Street Journal

November 21, 2021 - "Republicans fighting President Joe Biden’s coronavirus vaccine mandates are wielding a new weapon against the White House rules: natural immunity..... Florida wrote natural immunity into state law this week as GOP lawmakers elsewhere are pushing similar measures to sidestep vaccine mandates. Lawsuits over the mandates have also begun leaning on the idea. Conservative federal lawmakers have implored regulators to consider it when formulating mandates.... 

"The immunity debate comes as the country is experiencing another surge in infections and hospitalizations and 60 million people remain unvaccinated in a pandemic that has killed more than 770,000 Americans. Biden is hoping more people will get vaccinated because of workplace mandates set to take effect early next year but which face many challenges in the courts. And many Republicans eager to buck Biden have embraced the argument that immunity from earlier infections should be enough to earn an exemption from the mandates.

"'We recognize, unlike what you see going on with the federal proposed mandates and other states, we’re actually doing a science-based approach. For example, we recognize people that have natural immunity,' Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican who has been a chief critic of virus rules, said at a signing ceremony for sweeping legislation to hobble vaccine mandates this week. The new Florida law forces private businesses to let workers opt out of COVID-19 mandates if they can prove immunity through a prior infection, as well as exemptions based on medical reasons, religious beliefs, regular testing or an agreement to wear protective gear. The state health department, which is led by Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo, who opposes mandates and has drawn national attention over a refusal to wear a face mask during a meeting, will have authority to define exemption standards.

"The Republican-led New Hampshire Legislature plans to take up a similar measure when it meets in January. Lawmakers in Idaho and Wyoming, both statehouses under GOP-control, recently debated similar measures but did not pass them. In Utah, a newly signed law creating exemptions from Biden’s vaccine mandates for private employers allows people to duck the requirement if they have already had COVID.

"And the debate is not unique to the U.S. Russia has seen huge numbers of people seeking out antibody tests to prove they had an earlier infection and therefore don’t need vaccines.... [Russia, the European Union, and virtually all European governments recognize natural immunity as equivalent to vaccination in their health passes and mandates. - gd]

"'The shot is not by any means the only or proven way out of the pandemic. I’m not willing to give blind faith to the pharmaceutical narrative,' said Idaho Republican Rep. Greg Ferch. U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, a Kansas Republican and physician, along with 14 other GOP doctors, dentists and pharmacists in Congress, sent a letter in late September to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, urging the agency, when setting vaccination policies, to consider natural immunity.

"The White House has recently unveiled a host of vaccine mandates, sparking a flurry of lawsuits from GOP states, setting the stage for pitched legal battles.... In separate lawsuits, others are challenging local vaccine rules using an immunity defense.

"A 19-year-old student who refuses to be tested but claims he contracted and quickly recovered from COVID-19 is suing the University of Nevada, Reno, the governor and others over the state’s requirement that everyone, with few exceptions, show proof of vaccination in order to register for classes in the upcoming spring semester.... Another case, filed by workers of Los Alamos National Laboratory, challenges their workplace vaccine mandate for civil rights and constitutional violations, arguing the lab has refused requests for medical accommodations for those workers who have fully recovered from COVID-19. A similar lawsuit from Chicago firefighters and other city employees hit a bump last month when a judge said their case lacked scientific evidence to support the contention that the natural immunity for people who have had the virus is superior to the protection from the vaccine."

Read more: https://www.denverpost.com/2021/11/21/republicans-natural-immunity-vaccine-mandate/

Omicron variant sets off renewed Covid hysteria

Headline courtesy CNN News, Nov. 27, 2021.

Are We Overreacting to Omicron? | Brownstone Institute - Dr. Paul Elias Alexander:

November 26, 2021 - "With natural exposure immunity and early outpatient treatment and when combined with no reports of increased lethality, the WHO’s reaction of generating panic toward 'Omicron' is causing needless fear.... So too with the Biden administration’s newly imposed travel restrictions, which will achieve nothing and will once again disrupt trade and violate human rights. 

"The WHO has said that the Omicron variant can spread more quickly than other variants. Likely true. The virus is behaving just like how viruses behave. They are mutable and mutate and via Muller’s ratchet, we expect this to be milder and milder mutations and not more lethal ones.... The virus will mutate downward so that it can use the host (us) to propagate itself via our cellular metabolic machinery. The Delta has shown us this: it is very infectious and mostly non-lethal. Especially for children and healthy people. So is the WHO panicking the globe needlessly? Is this Covid-19 February 2020 once again? 

"The problem with South Africa as is with Australia and New Zealand and even island nations like Trinidad is ... low natural immunity to SAR-Cov-2. This is because, as we witnessed over the last year and more, if you lock down your society too long and too hard, you deny the nation and population from inching closer to population-level herd immunity. And you have no economy or society [into] which to  reemerge. You devastate your society for a pathogen that is largely harmless to the vast majority of people especially children.... 

"These nations thought that they could stay locked down and wait for a vaccine. This is a reasonable view though I was against lockdowns as they would and did cause crushing harms on especially poor persons and children. The problem is there was an opportunity cost because the vaccine we were waiting on was suboptimally developed without the proper safety testing or assessment of effectiveness. 

"We have data that the Pfizer vaccine loses 40% of antibodies per month, meaning in 3 months post-shot, you have low effective vaccinal immunity.... For example, the vaccine has failed to stop infection and spread against Delta. We have research findings by Singanayagam et al. (fully vaccinated individuals with breakthrough infections have peak viral load similar to unvaccinated cases and can efficiently transmit infection in household settings, including to fully vaccinated contacts), by Chau et al. (viral loads of breakthrough Delta variant infection cases in vaccinated nurses were 251 times higher than those of cases infected with prior strains early 2020), and by Riemersma et al. (no difference in viral loads when comparing unvaccinated individuals to those who have vaccine 'breakthrough' infections and if vaccinated individuals become infected with the delta variant, they may be sources of SARS-CoV-2 transmission to others) that reveal the vaccines have very suboptimal efficacy. 

"This situation of the vaccinated being infectious and transmitting the virus has also emerged in seminal nosocomial outbreak papers by Chau et al. (HCWs in Vietnam), the Finland hospital outbreak (spread among HCWs and patients), and the Israel hospital outbreak (spread among HCWs and patients). These studies have also revealed that the PPE and masking were essentially ineffective within the healthcare setting. All of the HCWs were double-vaccinated yet there was extensive spread to themselves and their patients. 

"In addition, Nordström et al. (vaccine effectiveness of Pfizer against infection waned progressively from 92% day 15-30 to 47% day 121-180, and from day 211 and onwards no effectiveness), Suthar et al. (a substantial waning of antibody responses and T cell immunity to SARS-CoV-2 and its variants, at 6 months following the second immunization), Yahi et al. (with Delta variant, neutralizing antibodies have a decreased affinity for the spike protein, whereas facilitating antibodies display a strikingly increased affinity), Juthani et al. (higher numbers of patients with severe or critical illness in those who received the Pfizer vaccine), Gazit et al. (SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees had a 13-fold increased risk for breakthrough infection with the Delta variant, and substantially elevated risk of symptomatic Covid and hospitalization), and Acharya et al. (no significant difference in cycle threshold values between vaccinated and unvaccinated, asymptomatic and symptomatic groups infected with Delta) collectively reveal the poor efficacy and even negative efficacy of the Covid vaccines. Levine-Tiefenbrun et al. reports that the viral load reduction effectiveness declines with time after vaccination, 'significantly decreasing at 3 months after vaccination and effectively vanishing after about 6 months.'

"As an example, the Swedish study (retrospective with 842,974 pairs (N=1,684,958) is particularly alarming for it shows that while the vaccine provides temporary protection against infection, the efficacy declines below zero and then to negative efficacy territory at approximately 7 months, underscoring that the vaccinated are highly susceptible to infection and eventually become highly infected (more so than the unvaccinated). A further example emerges from Ireland whereby reporting suggests that the Waterford city district has the State’s highest rate of Covid-19 infections, while the county also boasts the highest rate of vaccination in the Republic (99.7% vaccinated). Reports are that the U.S. Covid-19 deaths for 2021 surpassed the deaths from 2020, leading some to state that 'more people have died from COVID-19 in 2021, with most adults vaccinated and nearly all seniors), than in 2020 when nobody was vaccinated.' 

"Thus these nations that locked down and stayed that way are in a quandary for they do not know what to do now. If you open you will get surges in infection. Where is the money that was to go to hospital preparation?....

"We have a lot of natural immunity in the US, e.g. near 65-70% of the population. The open states (those that did not lock down too long and too hard and opened quickly) will likely do very well with this Omicron or any new variant. This also is the power of natural immunity. And we need not forget the potency of the overlooked ‘innate’ immunity with the innate antibodies and innate natural killer cellular compartment. This innate response is particularly potent in children (our first line of defense against pathogens) and is what has spared children from Covid and how children typically stave off pathogens, especially young children still laying down immunological memory. 

"Moreover, there is no reporting of increased virulence/lethality of this new Omicron variant. As yet this will remain the case based on Delta and prior variants. There are no guarantees but we operate based on risk and all things point to the same for this new variant. Just because there is a wave in SA does not mean that there will be waves in the US or Israel or other places with greater natural immunity. This was the prize of letting people enjoy day-to-day living. The nations that have ended lockdowns are likely to move past this new variant scare.... This is more of an overreaction by the WHO and governments and much ado about nothing."

Read more: https://brownstone.org/articles/are-we-overreacting-to-omicron/ 

Dr Alexander ... PhD. ... has experience in epidemiology and in the teaching [of] clinical epidemiology, evidence-based medicine, and research methodology. Dr Alexander is a former Assistant Professor at McMaster University in evidence-based medicine and research methods; former COVID Pandemic evidence-synthesis consultant advisor to WHO-PAHO Washington, DC (2020) and former senior advisor to COVID Pandemic policy in Health and Human Services (HHS) Washington, DC (A Secretary), ... currently a COVID-19 consultant researcher in the US-C19 research group.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Vaccine mandates are the new segregation

Vaccine mandates: a new form of ‘institutional segregation’ | Baltimore Sun - Peter Doshi & Aditi Bhagarva:

August 31, 2021 - "Increasingly, vaccination is no longer a matter of choice. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of workplaces and schools are instituting COVID-19 vaccine mandates.... But mandating people and their children who have consciously chosen not to get vaccinated — a group that tends to be younger, less educated, Republican, non-white and uninsured — is a recipe for creating new and deeper fractures within our society, the kind of fractures we may profoundly regret in hindsight.

"Let’s not sugarcoat it: This is a new form of institutionalized segregation. Yes, some unvaccinated adults may swallow this bitter pill and comply.... But many will see it — along with requirements that the unvaccinated wear masks or undergo regular COVID testing — as a thinly veiled attempt at public shaming....

"These practices diverge substantially from the historical norm of equal opportunity. For all other required vaccines, religious and philosophical exemptions allow unvaccinated children to enjoy the same educational experience as the vaccinated. This is because exemptions reflect a social value that in the United States, there are valid reasons for refusing treatments or vaccines, and these reasons will be respected. Once exempt, there are no sanctions experienced in everyday life. But with COVID vaccine mandates, even those with exemptions are being sanctioned, sending another clear message: We really don’t care about your reasons.

"And in schools, where a child’s experience will be shaped by their parents’ decisions and those of policymakers, the situation could become tragic. If schools invite vaccinated children to lose their masks, what was once an act of social responsibility could morph into a mark of disease. What should we anticipate? Children of different ages being barred from mingling. Children being bullied, ridiculed and mocked, with taunts using terms like 'covidiot.' Differential treatment toward unvaccinated children by some teachers... Vaccinate-or-mask policies will drive a wedge between children and parents, cause daily psychological harm, carrying long lasting consequences for future generations.

"Some might see mandate resistance as a symptom of vaccine misinformation. But considering most of these individuals have complied with mandates for routine vaccines such as mumps and measles, diseases of far less societal consequence than COVID, is it not worth listening to their objections against COVID vaccine mandates?

"For some, there’s little value in a vaccine against a disease they have already recovered from, even as new variants develop. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that by May, 120 million Americans of all ages (35% of the population) had already been infected with SARS-CoV-2. New data shows natural immunity is six to 13 times more protective against emerging variants than vaccines.

"For many, it is a product safety issue. The vaccines were developed and tested in months, not years, before rollout, and they were initially authorized by regulators in the context of an emergency. These people want greater assurances of safety and efficacy — something that requires additional time and data. Yet in response, some public commentators are calling for the FDA to speed its review process and approve all of the coronavirus vaccines.... Considering that the pivotal safety and efficacy trials were designed as two-year trials to finish in mid-2022, an approval this year can be seen as premature.

"Despite hundreds of millions of doses already in bodies, we are still in the learning phase regarding vaccine safety and efficacy, as can be witnessed in the data about “breakthrough infections” and previously unknown side effects like myocarditis and blood clots. Most people may accept this uncertainty and conclude that whatever the risks, they are outweighed by the benefits. But for the minority who desire greater scientific certainty, we should respect these reasons, not respond with mandates."

Read more: https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/op-ed/bs-ed-op-0901-no-vaccine-mandates-20210831-3f7ljoolbvg4bob76yqlnabqv4-story.html

New science undercuts case for vaccine mandates

McCaughey: New vax science shows mandates unwise | Boston Herald - Betsy McCaughey:

November 8, 2021 -"New scientific findings in the prestigious Lancet Infectious Diseases journal blow a hole in the argument that workers need to get vaccinated to protect those around them. The findings prove the foolishness of forcing police and other public employees to get jabbed or lose their pay. And President Joe Biden should retract his order to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to compel large employers to mandate vaccines.

"The journal reported Thursday that COVID-19 vaccines have 'minimal' impact on preventing transmission of the delta strain ... the COVID strain currently causing over 99% of U.S. cases. Vaccines protect the people getting the shots from serious illness, but they don’t stop the delta variant from spreading to others....

"Americans should choose to get vaccinated. The key word is 'choose'.... Though shots are no guarantee against getting infected and spreading it to others, they provide significant protection (90% or more) against hospitalization and death. I’m triple jabbed. Choosing not to get vaccinated is choosing to risk your own life. The health risk to others is minimal. Most vaccines — against polio, smallpox, measles and other diseases — prevent infection and spread. But not COVID-19 vaccines....

"Governors and mayors from Maine to Los Angeles are demanding that public employees, and even nurses and doctors, hailed just months ago as heroes, get vaxxed or go without a job. Just as politicians don’t read the bills before voting on them, they don’t keep up with science but still want to tell the rest of us what to do.

"The groundbreaking findings in Lancet show that fully vaccinated people who came down with COVID infected others in their household at the same rate (about 25%) as unvaccinated people did (about 23%). The vaccinated had just as much viral load in their upper respiratory tract, making them just as contagious. The British researchers also found that vaccinated people were only somewhat less likely to contract the virus (25%) compared with the unvaccinated (38%)....

"Meanwhile, the White House is pressing large companies to mandate vaccinations and calling on OSHA to enforce that policy with hefty penalties. The Build Back Better bill increases the penalties tenfold to as much as $700,000 per incident for hazardous conditions, threatening bankruptcy for all but the largest enterprises. The Biden administration expects to publish the rules in the Federal Register in the coming days, affecting about two-thirds of the private sector workforce. Yet the new science undercuts OSHA’s claim that unvaccinated people are a workplace hazard.

"Lancet Infectious Diseases stressed the urgency of improving current vaccines or developing new ones to actually 'protect against asymptomatic infections and onward transmission.' Foolishly, the Biden administration and Democrats in Congress vilify the vaccine developer Moderna for making a profit and threaten to seize its patents. It’s possible COVID will continue morphing into new variants, requiring new vaccines from companies like Moderna. When you’re fighting a war — in this case, against a killer disease — attacking your own ammunitions maker is no way to win it."

Read more: https://www.bostonherald.com/2021/11/08/mccaughey-new-vax-sciences-shows-mandates-unwise/

Read study: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(21)00648-4/fulltext