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Want to Gain Natural Immunity? Why Getting COVID on Purpose Is a Dangerous Idea
WebMD ^ | 01/13/2022 | Kathleen Doheny

Posted on 01/15/2022 10:09:01 AM PST by SeekAndFind

As COVID-19 cases from Omicron in the United States have skyrocketed to what seems like new records every other day, speculation is rising among some experts and scientific novices alike that infection for many seems unavoidable.

In a Senate hearing Tuesday, acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock, MD, even told the panel, "most people are going to get COVID."

In mid-December, World Health Organization Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, said vaccines alone won't protect us against Omicron. In late December, an epidemiologist told BBC News: "We have to be realistic; we are not going to stop Omicron."

Now, posts are popping up on social media resurrecting ideas similar to chickenpox parties, where you intentionally mingle with infected people. One restaurant in Italy is charging $150 for a chance to not only get fine wine with your dinner, but COVID-19, too.

So, if it's highly likely everyone will be infected, why not listen to the chatter out there, just get infected on purpose, and get it over with?

Because it’s a really bad idea, public health experts say.

"No, it is not inevitable that everybody will get Omicron infection," said Greg Poland, MD, a professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science in Rochester, MN, and editor-in-chief of the journal Vaccine. "There may well be higher rates of infection and high rates of exposure, but vaccinated, boosted, and mask-wearing individuals have a very high chance of protecting themselves from infections."

Becoming infected requires a chain of events that is not inevitable, he says.

"I think that it is certainly spreading like crazy," says Aaron Glatt, MD, chief of infectious diseases and hospital epidemiologist at Mount Sinai South Nassau in Oceanside, NY. "It is highly contagious and is going to impact even the vaccinated and boosted."

Even so, he says, "There's no way to say, 'Everyone is going to get it.'"

With intensive care units packed across the country and tests as hard to find as truffles, "'it certainly isn't the time to throw our hands up in the air and say, 'Everyone is going to get it,' " says Omai B. Garner, PhD, director of clinical microbiology for the UCLA Health System in California. It sends the wrong message, he says.

Saying that Omicron will affect us across the board "means we should stop trying to fight it," he says. If that happens, he says, "you will put the immunocompromised and the unvaccinated at risk. This is still a very dangerous disease for people who aren't vaccinated."

And the unvaccinated, Garner reminds people, include "an entire population under age 5" for whom no COVID vaccine has yet been authorized.

The Get-It-on-Purpose Narrative

The idea to deliberately catch COVID is also faulty reasoning, Poland says.

People may assume, mistakenly, that what they call "natural immunity" -- and what he prefers to more accurately term "illness-induced immunity" -- won't have any negative consequences, and that once they are infected, their immunity will be long-lasting.

Another issue, Poland says, is misunderstanding what “milder” means when saying Omicron is generally milder than the Delta variant. If you are unvaccinated or insufficiently vaccinated and become infected with the Omicron variant, he said, the prognosis is better than with Delta, but you could still get very sick and die.

"I would certainly not recommend that people go out and try to get Omicron," Glatt says. "If someone gets infected and recovers and does well, that would boost immunity, like [from] any infection." But "that means you have to get sick," and that's not a good idea.

The other misguided thinking, Poland says, is figuring that experts already know everything there is to know about Omicron.

Not true, he says. He cites recent studies, such as newly published research from the CDC that found a higher risk for a diabetes after children were infected with COVID-19.

Show Sources

Janet Woodcock, MD, acting FDA commissioner.

Greg Poland, MD, professor of medicine and infectious diseases, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science, Rochester, MN, editor-in-chief, Vaccine.

Aaron Glatt, MD, chief of infectious diseases and hospital epidemiologist, Mount Sinai South Nassau, Oceanside, NY.

Omai B. Garner, PhD, director of clinical microbiology, UCLA Health System in California.



TOPICS: Health/Medicine; Science; Society
KEYWORDS: breaking; bughunters; covid; covid19; covid1984; fakenews; gettheshotplease; getvaccinated; infection; naturalimmunity; pfizer; seekandfind; takethevaccine; vaccine; webmd
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To: SeekAndFind

FDA, Mt. Sinai, Mayo Clinic and UCLA sources. Yeah....stopped right there. Not gonna listen to this administration political fear-porn anymore.....


21 posted on 01/15/2022 10:36:43 AM PST by Gaffer
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To: SeekAndFind

22 posted on 01/15/2022 10:37:07 AM PST by GraceG ("If I post an AWESOME MEME, STEAL IT! JUST RE-POST IT IN TWO PLACES PLEASE")
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To: SeekAndFind
I had it and it was just another sinus infection.

Amoxicillin worked like a champ.

You don't die of the virus.

You die of the opportunistic bacterial infection is sets the stage for.


23 posted on 01/15/2022 10:37:24 AM PST by E. Pluribus Unum ("Communism is not love. Communism is a hammer which we use to crush the enemy." ― Mao Zedong [FJB])
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To: Brian Griffin

buh, buh, buh, but.....you all vaxxed and stuff, right? So no biggie.....right???


24 posted on 01/15/2022 10:40:00 AM PST by Gaffer
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To: SeekAndFind
"No, it is not inevitable that everybody will get Omicron infection," said Greg Poland, MD, a professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science in Rochester, MN, and editor-in-chief of the journal Vaccine. "There may well be higher rates of infection and high rates of exposure, but vaccinated, boosted, and mask-wearing individuals have a very high chance of protecting themselves from infections."

And the lies keep on coming. Do these people actually believe these falsehoods, or are they full on propagandists? And if the latter, what is their endgame?
25 posted on 01/15/2022 10:50:34 AM PST by rickomatic ( )
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To: ritpg

“Statistically, everyone is going to catch COVID”

Can you show your answer.


26 posted on 01/15/2022 10:57:30 AM PST by ifinnegan (Democrats kill babies and harvest their organs to sell)
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To: SeekAndFind
This is still a very dangerous disease for people who aren't vaccinated.

if you say so ...

The other misguided thinking, Poland says, is figuring that experts already know everything there is to know about Omicron.

oh, so maybe your blanket scary statement of what danger the unjabbed face is simply a guess?
(Or just a blanket scary statement intended to reap fear to your advantage?)

27 posted on 01/15/2022 10:57:38 AM PST by Tellurian (Your phone is your cattle tag. 2/4/2004: DARPA Lifelog terminated, Facebook initiated. )
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And the unvaccinated, Garner reminds people, include "an entire population under age 5" for whom no COVID vaccine has yet been authorized.

So, since this is a genetically modified gain-of-function lab virus that seems to be built with components that target procreating adults, why should the young ever be vaccinated?

(Oh, never mind, I know ... to make them weakened and dependent later in life)

28 posted on 01/15/2022 10:58:17 AM PST by Tellurian (Your phone is your cattle tag. 2/4/2004: DARPA Lifelog terminated, Facebook initiated. )
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To: SeekAndFind

It is a dangerous idea when you ban the EFFECTIVE therapeutic treatments. It’s dangerous for the vaxxxed as each illness lowers the effectiveness of their immune system. It is the vaxxxed that must be placed in sterilized bubble camps. Not the vaxxx free.


29 posted on 01/15/2022 11:08:56 AM PST by Lopeover (Biden & Harris are illegitimate.)
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To: SeekAndFind

After recovering, I told a few in my clinic, “Oh yeah, you need to catch the covid.” Flipped them completely out.


30 posted on 01/15/2022 11:21:05 AM PST by Libloather (Why do climate change hoax deniers live in mansions on the beach?)
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To: kearnyirish2
Even now, Biden is hoping state gubmints and employers will conspire to put his mandate through; he openly said so.

This is absolutely true. I also heard it from JPsaki. It's lawlessness run amok!

I believe any employer that mandates jabs now incurs greater potential liability. I'm good with that. Let 'em realize they'll have to pay for the greater incidence of all sorts of diseases among the jabbed.

31 posted on 01/15/2022 11:53:06 AM PST by rx (Truth will out!)
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To: SeekAndFind

There should be Covid Party Cruise Ship vacations, staffed with Front Line Doctors, and state of the art medical facilities on board.

Give certificates of Acquired Natural Immunity to recovered participants, and
generous insurance payouts to affected families in the unlikely event that any
actually die as a result of contracting Covid 19 during the cruise.

All agreed to in advance.


32 posted on 01/15/2022 12:12:53 PM PST by EasySt (Say not this is the truth, but so it seems to me to be, as I see this thing I think I see.#KAG )
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To: JudgemAll

Half of Denmark’s nfectiins occured within a 30-45 day period only after vaccination campaign.
~~~~

How much intelligence can this take? You run a country. There’s irrefutable news that a disease epidemic is approaching from surrounding countries. You know that cases are going to rise in your country, so you mobilize into a vaccination campaign. You vaccinate as many citizens with Astrazeneca the only vaccine available in the short time given. And you end up with half of the population down with COVID within 30-45 days after you start the campaign.

1. Astrazeneca turned out to be a flawed, relatively ineffective vaccine.

2. HellOoo? How many people would have been infected without the vaccinations? You don’t know that, do you?


33 posted on 01/15/2022 1:04:43 PM PST by nagant
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To: rx

Biden himself said it to the cameras.

My concern is that while it gives employers pause, it will lead many of them to seek the state gubmint’s intervention (just as they wanted Biden to assume responsibility for the whole thing).


34 posted on 01/16/2022 4:47:22 AM PST by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: SeekAndFind

Second article on this I’ve seen today. Disinfo from Pharmacy corporate?


35 posted on 01/16/2022 4:46:49 PM PST by NetAddicted ( Just looking)
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To: nagant

Completely false. The pandemic had been going for a good year and half and, unlike the US, Denmark was unscathed until it vaccinated.

As for Astra Zeneca being ineffective, that is an understatement. It killed people in record proportions and was pulled out.


36 posted on 01/21/2022 3:04:10 AM PST by JudgemAll (Democrats Fed. job-security in hates:hypocrites must be gay like us or be tested/crucified)
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