As part of a brand new study, The Yale School of Public Health looked into all the available data on natural immunity available and was able to estimate just how often those unvaccinated could potentially get infected with COVID-19.
That’s right! The researchers focused not on their risk of getting infected but on their risk of reinfection!
Of course, you might have heard of natural immunity that most people who catch COVID-19 and heal from it develop so how is it possible that you might get infected a second or even a third time?
Well, according to the study, it turns out that natural immunity is not forever. And while you might have figured that out yourself, you may still be surprised by how short-lived it really is!
As it turns out, people who remain unvaccinated can expect to get reinfected every 16 to 17 months or so!
Hayley Hassler, one of the authors of the study shared with Yale Daily News that “The overall goal of our study was to provide an answer to a question which, at this point in the pandemic would be just impossible to answer empirically, and that is how long after you have been infected by SARS-CoV-2 can you expect to possess immunity against the virus before you become vulnerable to reinfection?”
As mentioned before, the researchers were able to determine that natural immunity is quite limited.
Hassler went on to explain that “Our results are based on average times of waning immunity across multiple infected individuals. Any one of those individuals might experience longer or shorter durations of immunity depending on their immune status, on cross-immunity, age, and multiple other factors.”
This new data is rather concerning due to the fact that – as per updates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – only 57.1% of the U.S. population has been fully vaccinated against the COVID-19 virus.
Up front, I am fully vaccinated since April 2021. Having said this, 16 to 17 months seems like a not so bad thing.
Fully vaccinated people can get and transmit COVID-19, and according to the CDC, their immunization needs boosting in a little as eight months.
The study also does not account for naturally immune people who are re-exposed to COVID-19 within the 16 – 17 month window and have their immune systems “boosted” to fight off a reinfection.