WESTERN ASIA – A new study out of Qatar claims that so-called “natural immunity” bestowed upon individuals who have survived and recovered from severe cases of COVID-19 remains up to 97 percent effective against critical or life-threatening cases of the virus, even as long as 14 months later.
Dr. Laith Abu-Raddad – part of a team at Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar that conducted long-term research on people who have not received the COVID-19 vaccine – noted that as time went by, natural immunity granted by previous infection remained effective against serious cases of re-infection, as opposed to vaccinated individuals, where protection eventually waned.
“Effectiveness of primary infection against severe, critical, or fatal COVID-19 re-infection was 97.3 percent…irrespective of the variant of primary infection or re-infection, and with no evidence for waning. Similar results were found in sub-group analyses for those ≥50 years of age,” he said.
Abu-Raddad noted that the findings of the study – which has not yet been peer-reviewed – indicate that natural immunity offers a higher degree of protection long-term than vaccination does, stating that natural immunity acquired by individuals after very serious bouts of COVID-19 “remains very strong, with no evidence for waning, irrespective of variant, for over 14 months.”
A separate study in May correlated these findings, with Swedish researchers stating that a fully-vaccinated person’s protection was only approximately 54 percent effective against the COVID Omicron variant.
Yet another study, carried out by scientists in South Africa, stated that AstraZeneca and Pfizer vaccines initially spiked in effectiveness against COVID at 88 percent, but quickly lowered to 70 percent or less.
South African scientists, meanwhile, found the effectiveness of the AstraZeneca and Pfizer vaccines peaked at 88 percent and quickly dropped to 70 percent or lower.
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