A pre-print study (not yet peer-reviewed) by U.S. Government researchers shows vaccinated people produce a less comprehensive immune system response following SARS-CoV-2 infection than unvaccinated people.
The researchers examined data from the Moderna Covid vaccine trial and found that, compared to unvaccinated controls, vaccinated participants produced far fewer N-antibodies. These are antibodies against the nucleocapsid protein inside the virus particle, in contrast to S-antibodies against the spike protein that the vaccines target. N-antibodies were detected in 40% (21 of 52) of infected vaccine recipients versus 93% (605 of 648) of placebo recipients. This means those infected after being vaccinated produced N-antibodies at less than half the rate of the unvaccinated.
The researchers found that N-seroconversion (producing N-antibodies following infection) was more likely for infections with higher viral loads. So they checked to see if the difference was due to the vaccinated having milder infections with lower viral loads owing to the vaccine. They found that it wasn’t: for the same viral load the unvaccinated were around 14 times (13.67, 95% confidence interval 5.17-36.16) more likely to have detectable N-antibodies following infection than the vaccinated. Look at the contrasting curves below: the yellow unvaccinated curve is much higher than the blue vaccinated curve, showing that for any given viral load (x-axis) the probability of detecting N-antibodies following infection (y-axis) is much lower for vaccinated than unvaccinated.
This means that although a vaccinated person may have S-antibodies from the vaccine, following infection he or she is much less likely to gain N-antibodies following infection than an unvaccinated person. This weaker immune response may make him or her more susceptible to future re-infection, particularly by variants which evade the S-antibodies, such as Omicron.
This also means, as the study authors point out, that a population survey of N-antibodies after a vaccination campaign will significantly underestimate the total number of people previously infected, as many of the vaccinated will not have produced N-antibodies following infection. This is likely one reason why the UKHSA reports around 42% of blood donors in England with N-antibodies to the end of February 2022, while the ONS estimates from its infection survey that around 71% of the country has been infected by February 11th (see below). The high infection rate among the vaccinated during the Delta and Omicron waves supports this explanation.
Let’s break those data down into successive Covid waves so we can see how many were infected in each wave according to the ONS and how many developed N-antibodies according to the UKHSA. In the below I’ve read 8% off the antibody graph above for the initial wave and, assuming the same proportion were infected in that wave, added a six point uplift to the cumulative infection total to allow for the pre-April 2020 infections.
The most striking aspect of this chart is how much bigger the Delta wave was in infections than in antibodies – a result, we can assume, of the vaccines inhibiting N-seroconversion. It’s also notable that the pre-vaccine Alpha wave (almost all the infections for which occurred before February 2021, when very few were vaccinated) was around twice as large in infections than in antibodies, suggesting a relatively low rate of seroconversion despite the lack of vaccines, the reason for which is unclear. Then for Omicron, the ratio between the two gets much smaller, around 1.5, meaning infections were only 50% higher than antibodies. Here are those figures with the ratios.
The low ratio of antibodies to infections for Omicron is a strong indicator that the vaccine is no longer inhibiting N-seroconversion. This may be because Omicron is so different to earlier variants; in particular, it has many immune-evading mutations in its spike protein, so that the S-antibodies from the vaccines are largely ineffective against it. This means the immune system must engage with it more comprehensively to fight it off, thus producing N-antibodies. The evasion of S-antibodies, of course, is also why the vaccines do so little to protect against Omicron. The lack of N-seroconversion following infection is likely why many vaccinated people caught Omicron not long after catching Delta. Additionally, the relatively small size of the Omicron wave in South Africa, where vaccination rates are low, adds to the evidence that vaccination played a significant part in driving the Omicron wave in the U.K. and other highly vaccinated countries.
To sum up: antibody surveys appear always to underestimate the number of Covid infections, as a significant proportion fail to seroconvert. This is particularly true following vaccination with vaccines which target a specific protein, such as the current Covid vaccines, though was also true in the pre-vaccination era with the Alpha wave, albeit to a lesser extent. While antibodies are generally a better guide for infections with high viral load, this doesn’t hold following vaccination. Antibody surveys particularly underestimate the size of the Delta wave in populations with high vaccination rates. The vaccine inhibition of N-seroconversion appears to fade with a vaccine-evading variant like Omicron as the wider immune system re-engages.
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Aye, aye, what’s going on here then? I thought DS had put a lid on this.
It was article the involvement of the Helen MacNamara woman that disappeared from here and from the Telegraph.
I reiterate the points I made last time
1) Does this young lady think it would be OK to ban a fan for posting “anti-Lesbian” or “misogynistic” Tweets? If so then isn’t that a bit inconsistent?
2) Would she accept that identity politics in which she is apparently involved in so far as she “campaigns for gay, bisexual and women’s rights” (not sure what rights those people lack) tends to lead to what has happened to her?
I have nothing personally against the young lady and do not believe she should be banned, think the PL and the club are disgraceful etc etc. Just think we need to look at the bigger picture.
I could apply your post just as easily to JK Rowling.
Possibly. I don’t know much about her, other than she has attracted a lot of vitriol for being a “TERF” and has stood her ground. I don’t know what her general views are on freedom of speech and “identity politics”.
I’m certainly not suggesting that this young lady or J K Rowling should be condemned completely, but if their positions are arguably inconsistent neither should they be approved of completely.
Very few people are free speech absolutists – something I think is a negative.
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/how-project-fear-and-the-vaccine-rewrote-the-software-of-the-brain/
The Great Reset is based on resets of our brains.
“the manipulation of human behaviour has now gone beyond an understanding of psychology, sociology or through ‘nudging’, and into the realms of ‘environmental engineering’.”
Well weren’t we just discussing this very topic yesterday? Yes the censorship net is getting ever tighter, our ability to speak freely throttled by the corrupt, authoritarian woketards;
”Last month the European Parliament passed a report calling on the Council to include hate speech and hate crime among so-called “Euro crimes”.
In other words, offensive speech may soon be established as a criminal offence, which all member states must integrate into their own legal systems. However, no clear threshold has been set for what makes speech prosecutable.
According to Maite Pagazaurtundúa of Renew Europe, rapporteur for the report and Member of the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, “we must protect people who are attacked, persecuted and harassed … always in accordance with the principle of proportionality and guaranteeing freedom of expression for citizens”.
This sounds nice, but it is also dangerously vague.
The Parliament’s report comes as part of a process started by the Commission in 2020. In her inaugural speech, Ursula von der Leyen had stressed the need “to extend the list of EU crimes to all forms of hate crime and hate speech – whether because of race, religion, gender or sexuality”.
This is yet another example of decisions that are being imposed on Europeans top-down.
Would quoting from St. Paul’s 1 Corinthians, where homosexuality is clearly condemned, be banned because it violates somebody’s “dignity”? Would stating that there are only two genders become criminalised? Would saying that Europe should remain a predominantly Christian continent break the law? The questions are not rhetoric.”
https://brusselssignal.eu/2024/02/the-eus-hate-speech-laws-are-an-attack-on-free-speech-itself-this-years-european-elections-may-be-the-last-chance-to-defend-our-rights/
Von der Leyen show us your deleted TXT messages you corrupt Bit@h.
Yesterday I caught a clip from Jeremy Vine (I know) They were asking for positive experiences from the Lockdowns — Many said more time with family etc, but they had a guest on the show on the big screen who was based. He said he enjoyed the tranquility but also learned to ignore the Press and that Lockdown was the UKs biggest psyop. Nobody answered to that. I’m surprised they invited him on when you consider how they treated Bev Turner, and how fast they got shot of Dan Wotton on there in early 2020.
Thanks tof
I don’t know where she gets them from but some of them are crackers
This is a classic too