Meanwhile, another study published in medRxiv (preprint) on December 8th, 2021, confirmed that vaccine-escape is happening with the Omicron variant, which means that the current batch of vaccines are not capable of neutralizing the Omicron variant. Too bad for everyone that’s already had 3 doses of the magic elixir. Go back to square one.

There are moments when the public health messaging during Covid reminds me of the well-known parable of the blind men and the elephant wherein the blind men argue about the nature of an elephant based on the kernel of truth at their fingertips despite being utterly unable to see the larger reality standing before their eyes. But we are not living through a harmless parable. Our public health officials, vaccine makers, and media are manipulating our perception of reality. They are trying to blind us from seeing the full elephant by using deliberate oversimplification, half-truths, and out-of-context facts to manufacture (and exploit) an illusion of unprecedented danger. The most damaging lies are the ones that are built on a distortion of the truth. 

So, it’s time for another deep dive into the evolution of variants and the subtleties of our immune systems to get some perspective…

Figure 1: The Blind Men and the Elephant: oversimplification conceals the broader picture. But unlike the blind men in the parable, the half truths told during Covid are being told by those whose eyes are wide open to the whole lie but want to prevent you from seeing the whole elephant.

Table of Contents

• Unravelling the contradictions: How can natural immunity be long-lasting and still not protect you against next year’s variant?

• If immune escape is inevitable, how do we create long-lasting protection against a contagious and rapidly evolving virus?

• The importance of frequent exposure: Lessons from malaria and the RSV virus.

• If we get natural “updates” through re-exposure, why do we give booster shots for many other diseases that are included in childhood vaccination programs?

• The dirty trick played with “variants”

• The bitter pill: How long does immunity last after vaccination?

Unravelling the Contradictions: How Can Natural Immunity Be Long-Lasting and Still Not Protect You Against Next Year’s Variant?

Let’s imagine you got infected by the original Wuhan strain of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Your immune system has now been trained to give you natural immunity… to the original Wuhan strain. The current batch of vaccines are likewise based on this Wuhan strain. The Alpha variant is genetically very similar, so your immune system will also recognize and neutralize the Alpha variant. But as mutations stack up, it becomes harder and harder for your immune system to recognize and neutralize new variants as they become increasingly genetically distinct from the variant that infected you. You may still have long lasting immunity to the Alpha variant, but perhaps only partial cross-reactive immunity to the Lambda variant, and so on. The further new variants drift from the genetics of the variant you catch, the less efficient your adaptive immune response will be in neutralizing these new variants. 

Figure 2: Prior immunity becomes less and less effective as new variants evolve.

Note, this is a separate and compounding issue to the gradual fading of immunity, which I discussed in my recent book, Autopsy of a Pandemic #CommissionsEarned. So, to be clear, there are two separate issues that affect our immune system’s ability to protect us against re-infection: 1) fading immunity as the adaptive immune system gradually forgets its training and 2) the issue of genetic drift, which eventually allows newly emerging variants to bypass our immunity even if we still have immunity to a previous variant. 

With a fast-mutating virus like a coronavirus, it was always just a matter of time until some new variant would be able to start re-infecting people even if they acquired long-lasting immunity through a previous infection (or through vaccination – more on that boondoggle in a moment). It’s called immune escape. So, beyond a certain point, long-lasting immunity doesn’t matter because the virus has moved on from what your immune system has been trained to do. The only way to prevent our immune systems from being left behind by the never-ending conveyor belt of new variants is to periodically update our adaptive immune systems to recognize changes to the evolving virus. And no, this is NOT a case for a lifetime regimen of booster shots, as you will soon see. 

Figure 3: Your adaptive immune system is trained to recognize and neutralize the particular variant to which you are exposed. New variants will eventually be able to get around it unless your immune system is periodically updated to recognize the changing virus.