Infections from coronavirus that occur in vaccinees - so-called «breakthroughs» because they escape immune protection - then significantly improve the body's immune response against different variants of the virus, according to US scientists.
The small laboratory study found that the antibodies in the blood samples of those vaccinated who were subsequently infected with coronavirus were both much more numerous and more effective in terms of their ability to neutralise coronavirus (up to 1.000%), compared to antibodies raised two weeks after the second dose of Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.
The researchers, led by Assistant Professor of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology Fikadu Tafese of the Oregon Health and Science University School of Medicine, who published in the Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA), reported that any exposure to coronavirus after vaccination - in fact - enhances the immune system's response to subsequent exposures even against new variants (which is probably the case for Omicron).
The study, which compared blood samples from 52 people with an average age of 38 years who had all been vaccinated with Pfizer/BioNTech and of whom half (26) subsequently had a mild Covid-19 infection (ten due to a Delta variant), shows that a vaccinee infection generates a strong immune response against Delta and this “response” may prove highly effective against other variants.
«You can't get a better immune response than that. Our study shows that people who are vaccinated and then exposed to breakthrough infection gain «super» immunity. Although we did not specifically look at the Omicron variant, based on the results of our study, we expect that breakthrough infections due to Omicron will generate an equally strong immune response among vaccinees,» said Dr. Tafese.
«Once someone is vaccinated and then exposed to the virus, they are probably going to get reasonably good protection against future variants. The end result will be a gradual decline in the severity of the global pandemic.», noted Marcel Kerlin, Associate Professor of Infectious Diseases at the same University.
