4 ms·

> COVID vaccines particularly give you far higher neutralization titers than a prior infection. Do you have a source for that?

icedchai 5y ago
Here's one: https://www.contagionlive.com/view/immune-response-from-mrna-covid-19-vaccines-is-more-robust-than-natural-infection https://www.contagionlive.com/view/immune-response-from-mrna...
- petertodd 5y ago
  The study itself says that the immune response to the vaccine is not as diverse as a natural infection. That's how the study tried to figure out who had been infected: "Natural exposure induces a dominant Ab response against the nucleocapsid protein (NP), but since NP is not in the vaccine, there is no vaccine induced response against it. In this way vaccinated people who had a prior natural exposure can be classified because they have Abs to NP." Simply looking at one aspect of immunity - detectable antibodies in the blood - is a very incomplete way of looking at the overall level of protection. For example, it's well known that mucosal immunity is important, and injected vaccines have a hard time inducing that kind of immunity: https://theprint.in/opinion/why-a-mucosal-covid-vaccine-has-a-better-shot-at-ending-the-pandemic/589821/ https://theprint.in/opinion/why-a-mucosal-covid-vaccine-has-... It's also concerning that there is evidence that while people who have been vaccinated are much less likely to be infected. If they do get infected, they are more likely to be infected with one of the variants than unvaccinated: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/bioproject/PRJNA728463 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/bioproject/PRJNA728463 The immune response developed to our vaccines is quite specific - they only generate the spike protein - which leads to a much less diverse response than a natural infection. Finally, the study you quoted can't really compare apples to apples anyway, as it's defining prior infection as simply having some level of antibody response, without considering how mild or severe those infections actually were.
  - amluto 5y ago
    > Simply looking at one aspect of immunity - detectable antibodies in the blood - is a very incomplete way of looking at the overall level of protection. For example, it's well known that mucosal immunity is important, and injected vaccines have a hard time inducing that kind of immunity: https://theprint.in/opinion/why-a-mucosal-covid-vaccine-has- https://theprint.in/opinion/why-a-mucosal-covid-vaccine-has-... I have not seen an actual credible claim that injectable vaccines can’t produce mucosal immunity. IIRC the HPV vaccines seem to generate strongly protective mucosal immunity. The opinion piece you linked seems off, too: the mRNA vaccines and (possibly to a lesser extent) the viral vector vaccines do seem to prevent most infections. But it’s definitely true that antibodies in the blood are an incomplete picture. There are also memory B cell and all kinds of T cells.
  - nerbert 5y ago
    The spike protein is what is in common between all the variants. Getting a more diverse response doesn’t mean better protection.
  - lamontcg 5y ago
    High NAbs titers in the blood against spike will almost certainly be protective and even in the absence of sterilizing mucosal immunity will confine any infection to the upper respiratory tract. I'm nowhere near as concerned about a variant infecting my upper respiratory tract as I am with being unvaccinated and having any of the variants attack my heart, kidneys, lungs and blood. The use of spike was also not a mistake. Attempts to produce vaccines against NP for SARS-CoV-1 produced signs of ADE, so that is why everyone is using spike-only (other than the few inactivated virus vaccines).
  - timr 5y ago
    > It's also concerning that there is evidence that while people who have been vaccinated are much less likely to be infected. If they do get infected, they are more likely to be infected with one of the variants than unvaccinated That's not "concerning"...it's a truism. You've made those people immune to the wild-type strain. If they're going to get infected, it's going to be to a variant. You're still missing the denominator (i.e. how often does it happen?) and the most important question: how serious is it when they do get infected? So far, the answers are "not often", and "not serious", respectively.

icedchai 5y ago

Here's one: https://www.contagionlive.com/view/immune-response-from-mrna-covid-19-vaccines-is-more-robust-than-natural-infection https://www.contagionlive.com/view/immune-response-from-mrna...

petertodd 5y ago
The study itself says that the immune response to the vaccine is not as diverse as a natural infection. That's how the study tried to figure out who had been infected: "Natural exposure induces a dominant Ab response against the nucleocapsid protein (NP), but since NP is not in the vaccine, there is no vaccine induced response against it. In this way vaccinated people who had a prior natural exposure can be classified because they have Abs to NP." Simply looking at one aspect of immunity - detectable antibodies in the blood - is a very incomplete way of looking at the overall level of protection. For example, it's well known that mucosal immunity is important, and injected vaccines have a hard time inducing that kind of immunity: https://theprint.in/opinion/why-a-mucosal-covid-vaccine-has-a-better-shot-at-ending-the-pandemic/589821/ https://theprint.in/opinion/why-a-mucosal-covid-vaccine-has-... It's also concerning that there is evidence that while people who have been vaccinated are much less likely to be infected. If they do get infected, they are more likely to be infected with one of the variants than unvaccinated: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/bioproject/PRJNA728463 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/bioproject/PRJNA728463 The immune response developed to our vaccines is quite specific - they only generate the spike protein - which leads to a much less diverse response than a natural infection. Finally, the study you quoted can't really compare apples to apples anyway, as it's defining prior infection as simply having some level of antibody response, without considering how mild or severe those infections actually were.
- amluto 5y ago
  > Simply looking at one aspect of immunity - detectable antibodies in the blood - is a very incomplete way of looking at the overall level of protection. For example, it's well known that mucosal immunity is important, and injected vaccines have a hard time inducing that kind of immunity: https://theprint.in/opinion/why-a-mucosal-covid-vaccine-has- https://theprint.in/opinion/why-a-mucosal-covid-vaccine-has-... I have not seen an actual credible claim that injectable vaccines can’t produce mucosal immunity. IIRC the HPV vaccines seem to generate strongly protective mucosal immunity. The opinion piece you linked seems off, too: the mRNA vaccines and (possibly to a lesser extent) the viral vector vaccines do seem to prevent most infections. But it’s definitely true that antibodies in the blood are an incomplete picture. There are also memory B cell and all kinds of T cells.
- nerbert 5y ago
  The spike protein is what is in common between all the variants. Getting a more diverse response doesn’t mean better protection.
- lamontcg 5y ago
  High NAbs titers in the blood against spike will almost certainly be protective and even in the absence of sterilizing mucosal immunity will confine any infection to the upper respiratory tract. I'm nowhere near as concerned about a variant infecting my upper respiratory tract as I am with being unvaccinated and having any of the variants attack my heart, kidneys, lungs and blood. The use of spike was also not a mistake. Attempts to produce vaccines against NP for SARS-CoV-1 produced signs of ADE, so that is why everyone is using spike-only (other than the few inactivated virus vaccines).
- timr 5y ago
  > It's also concerning that there is evidence that while people who have been vaccinated are much less likely to be infected. If they do get infected, they are more likely to be infected with one of the variants than unvaccinated That's not "concerning"...it's a truism. You've made those people immune to the wild-type strain. If they're going to get infected, it's going to be to a variant. You're still missing the denominator (i.e. how often does it happen?) and the most important question: how serious is it when they do get infected? So far, the answers are "not often", and "not serious", respectively.