Fact Check: No, natural immunity isn’t as good as a COVID-19 vaccine, experts say
Global News
Vaccines offer consistent protection against COVID-19 -- and unlike natural immunity, you don’t have to get sick to gain the protective benefits of a vaccine.
Natural immunity will not protect you against COVID-19 as well as an mRNA vaccine, according to both experts and the research.
Multiple anti-vaccine groups touted natural immunity as a viable alternative to getting vaccinated, but experts say the natural immunity is unreliable — especially when there’s a safe and effective vaccine out there.
Even if you’ve already had COVID, you should still get vaccinated, doctors say.
“The idea of natural immunity, people are kind of taking that and running with it, thinking, ‘I don’t need to get vaccinated.’ That’s not true, either,” said Dr. Sumon Chakrabarti.
“Natural immunity does certainly protect you, but we don’t know to what extent.”
Vaccines, on the other hand, offer consistent protection against COVID-19 — and unlike natural immunity, you don’t have to get sick to gain the protective benefits of a vaccine.
When you get sick and, eventually, beat a virus, your body learns about the virus that made you sick — so you can ideally avoid being infected again in the future.
“Our immune systems have evolved over millions and millions of years to provide us with lasting immunity from infections that we encounter early in life,” said Dr. Matthew Miller, assistant dean at McMaster University’s department of biochemistry and biomedical sciences.
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