...Still, speaking in a personal capacity, Woolhouse says that some influential modellers in the United Kingdom were wrong not to allow for any reduced severity, instead working with assumed hospitalization rates for Omicron that were identical to those of previous variants. “That’s clearly a pessimistic assumption,” he says. “I do think it could have been much clearer from the beginning that there was this possibility it was less pathogenic and, you know, being crystal clear on what the policy implications of that difference might be.”...
The number of hospitalizations being the same (and they were) reflects the bottom line vulnerability of those still unvaccinated. Every time a variant strikes, the same hospital statistic erupts as well. The people without the vaccine lack it's protections regardless of the immunity otherwise. I strongly believe the mRNA vaccines carry a far better identification of the virus than normal immunity does in reaction to an illness.
At any rate, the infection rate with omicron (a level three virus) was higher. We saw that increase in the waste water testing in Boston. So, in realizing more people were infected and the hospitalization rate remained the same, it was due to the increased number of infections and the steady state number of Americans UNDER PROTECTED.
The unvaccinated still remain a threat to more and more variants.
Natural immunity is interesting, but, is the body's reaction to contracting the virus the same as the ability of the mRNA vaccine? I think there may be a missing virility to the body's immune response considering the poor state of those infected and the length of time it took to recover. The body is hit hard by these viruses, it takes a lot of energy to fight it off and recover. That is energy not necessarily available to the immune system as people are so very ill.
COVID-19 didn't show up for five days. That is a lot of virus being dumped into the body to enter cells and replicate. It was only after a high number of virus (viral load) was in the body on the fifth day did any immune response become noticeable. It was so late in the infection that it was often too late for any effective response from medicine in critical care units or otherwise. I really don't trust the immune response with these viruses. Besides, there is the burgeoning evidence of brain damage. The blood clots are proving to cause irreparable damage. Even being willing to be infected seems to me to be a risky business.
THIS IS NOT THE FLU AND NEVER WILL BE.
