COVID-19: Are you still considered "fully vaccinated" even after omicron? Here's what you need to know.

 Author: S. Gordon-Jeffery

research article

A new report released on February 11, 2022 published findings which could call into question the vaccination status of millions across the world. Though the findings were focused on ten states in the US, they may have implications for vaccinated persons in other countries. The purpose of the study was to measure the effectiveness of the novel coronavirus vaccines in preventing hospitalizations, urgent care and emergency department visits of vaccinated persons during the peak of both the delta and omicron surges. 

The study was published in the CDC's  

 'Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report' and tracked 334,612 cases, 241,204 being emergency department/urgent care cases and 93,408 hospitalizations, during the period August 26, 2021 to January 22, 2022. 

The report also looked at vaccine effectiveness after two (2) doses, three (3) primary doses (given to people with compromised immune systems) and two (2) doses plus a booster shot. 

Before I proceed let me give you some background information.

The Case for Boosters 

On September 22, 2021, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that they were authorizing the emergency use of the Pfizer vaccine as a booster shot, two (2) months after Israel had already started to give boosters to persons 60 years and older. There were many medical experts in the US who did not agree with the decision and felt the rush to using boosters was premature. 

In fact, two (2) senior scientists at the US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA), objected to the move of the government to begin administering the boosters. Drs. Krause and Gruber published a scathing review in The Lancet stating that there was no credible evidence to support the need for booster shots for the general population. The doctors had previously revealed that they would be leaving the agency, they never said why 😕, and were careful to state that the opinions expressed in the document were strictly their own and did not represent the agency they had worked for.

 The US government gave its approval anyway. Why?

The research done by the Israeli scientists may have had some influence on their decision. Let me explain.

At first, it was hailed as the best thing to do, and it was promised to be a success. It was splashed across the media that the Israeli government's risk to administer a third shot was a resounding success in crushing the onslaught of the severe delta outbreak during the summer of 2021. After boosting their senior citizens, Israel turned to boosting their children from ages 5 to 11 years old in August 2021, because they were considered the most vulnerable of the population. Though Israel had one of the highest vaccination (two (2) doses) rates per capita, when the delta variant surged through the country many of the hospitalizations were among the elderly and the very young. 

Looking at this reality on the ground, and taking heed to a study their own scientists had conducted which revealed that vaccine effectiveness wanes dramatically at the six month mark, the Israeli's approved boosters for the elderly first, then for children, and eventually anyone who wanted a booster could get it. 

Initially, it seemed to be working as daily hospitalization and infection rates fell in the weeks that followed. The country celebrated the apparent vanquishing of the virus. Gabriel Barbash, a professor of epidemiology at the Weizmann Institute of Science and a top health expert was quoted as saying, "There is no question that the third vaccine, the booster, saved Israel". He went further to say, "I think life is going back to normal, but to new normal, We are not going to give up masks. They are going to be required in any place that is a close space..." He also said boosters are a "powerful tool".  [1]  Another apparent success of the government's vaccination campaign was the fact that schools and businesses never needed to be closed down during that period, until omicron. 

Omicron was detected in the country in December 2021 (winter season) with just three (3) cases in Gaza (Palestinian territory) in the Israeli occupied West Bank area. It quickly ran through the population, infecting vaccinated, boosted and unvaccinated. Scientists at the Sheba Medical Center scrambled into action and started giving fourth shots to a limited number of persons which included their own staff. In their preliminary study, approximately 154 persons received a fourth shot of the Pfizer, while 120 persons got Moderna as their fourth shot. 

While they discovered that the shot did give an immune response and one stronger than the one induced by the third shot, it still was "not enough for the omicron... the level of antibodies needed to protect and not to got infected by omicron is probably too high for the vaccine, even if its a good vaccine." [2] These were the words of a scientist involved in the study.  Though small in focus the study revealed something that could no longer be denied --the current set of vaccines whether from Pfizer or Moderna-- were no match for omicron.

After this revelation, what did the Israeli government do? 

They offered the fourth shot/second booster anyway. Yes, they did. In January 2022, all who were considered eligible were encouraged to get the 2nd booster.

Around the same time (winter season) in the United States, hospitals were struggling to deal with the number of omicron related cases as the variant had now become the most dominant strain in the country.

Omicron had become a problem it seemed no one could readily solve. Only recently did Moderna announce that they were now testing an omicron specific vaccine, but who knows if that will work.

One thing is abundantly clear, if not to many people, but to me, the vaccines are no longer effective against COVID-19, and the CDC knows it too. 

Fast forward to February 2022, the CDC has to release findings concerning if the vaccines and boosters really work because of the prevalence of breakthrough cases across the country. In July 2021, there were over 120,000 breakthrough cases in 38 states, as collated by NBC News, but as of January, 2022, it is estimated that breakthrough cases could be in the millions. In fact, in the state of Washington's Clark County, breakthrough cases now amount to more than half of new cases as reported by the Washington State Department of Health. 

Back to the CDC report.

In the report they used an interesting criteria to define who was vaccinated and unvaccinated for the purpose of their study.

The index date represents the time period I mentioned above-- between August 26, 2021 to January 22, 2022-- fourteen days after it was first recommended that a third dose/booster shot be used from Pfizer. Before then several states including New York, had gone ahead and began giving the boosters to their citizens before the FDA had given its full approval. Before then, only persons with weak immune systems and the elderly were offered the shot. Booster shots were given full approval by the FDA in November, and all persons 18 years and older would be eligible. Let's read how the CDC determined vaccination status for their study:

"Vaccination status was categorized based on the number of vaccine doses received and number of days between receipt of the most recent vaccine dose and the index medical encounter date (referred to as time since vaccination). Patients with no record of mRNA vaccination before the index date were considered unvaccinated. Persons categorized as having received 3 doses included those who received a third dose in a primary series or a booster dose after a 2 dose primary series (including the reduced-dosage Moderna booster)." [3]

Let me break this down for you.

What does this mean? 👇

"Patients with no record of mRNA vaccination before the index date were considered unvaccinated."

It means if by the time they started the study, you had not received primary doses (2-dose shot from Pfizer or Moderna) or a booster shot from one of the same, you were not considered vaccinated.

What about this part? 👉 "Vaccination status was categorized based on the number of vaccine doses received and number of days between receipt of the most recent vaccine dose and the index medical encounter date (referred to as time since vaccination)."

Well, the number of doses - It's easy. They would look into the number of doses the patient received, whether it was two doses or three primary doses for the immunocompromised or two doses plus a booster.

Number of days since last dose and the index medical encounter - the number of days that passed since the patient's last vaccine shot and the time they were included in the study. The researchers looked at persons from two months up to five months after they received their last dose to "test for a trend in waning". [4]

They found what they were looking for. You can find more details on the results here.

You may be asking, "So wait, what about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine? That was available as an option in the US, what about that?"

Well, interestingly, persons who had taken the one dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine were not included in the study. There was also no research into the vaccine effectiveness of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine since it still has not received emergency approval in the country.

Vaccine Effectiveness

But why did they exclude persons who took the Johnson & Johnson shot from the study? Is the single dose jab not effective against Covid? Well, according to the W.H.O. the J&J jab was only 66.9% effective against moderate and severe symptoms caused by Covid, and we're not talking about omicron here. See data here.

So what about AstraZeneca? Why has the US government been reluctant to give this vaccine its approval?

Does the US and other developed countries perceive the mRNA vaccines as superior?

Wait!...

Could this be the reason in 2021 when some Jamaicans travelled to the UK, after the country had imposed its 'vaccinated travellers only policy', they were asked to quarantine, even after they showed their vaccination cards?

Is it then plausible to believe the United States and other first world countries do not recognise the AstraZeneca brand as a sufficient vaccine?

I can't say definitively, because no health professional has come out publicly to say they have a concern about the brand's effectiveness. But if they did, what was written on the WHO's website could possibly give us a hint.

On the WHO's (World Health Organization) website it notes that in clinical trials the AstraZeneca vaccine only had 76% efficacy against symptomatic Covid and this was specific to a timeframe of 15 days after the second dose.

What? Only 76%?

But shouldn't one be fully vaccinated after about 14 days?

The WHO did not disclose if this vaccine is effective in blocking transmission of the virus from person to person, but instead noted that more research needed to be done. They also said there was no data on its effectiveness against omicron. You can read more details here. Compared to Pfizer and Moderna's shots that tout efficacy rates in the 90s percentage against previous SARS-CoV-2 infections, Johnson and Johnson and AstraZeneca just don't measure up.

But these mRNA vaccines are not 100% effective. Their effectiveness wanes after just five/six months! And we also now know that against omicron they perform very poorly.

More and more, people in the United States are themselves becoming confused about their status. Initially, they were told that two (2) doses were enough and that the vaccines provided immunity from Covid. Now the narrative has changed and Americans are being aggressively encouraged to keep 'up to date' with their booster shots. Indeed, other countries including Jamaica are now offering booster shots to their citizens.

If you go on to the CDC website, on its page titled 'When You've Been Fully Vaccinated', in a highlighted section it says a person is considered fully vaccinated "...2 weeks after their second dose in a 2-dose series, such as Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, or 2 weeks after a single-dose vaccine, such as Johnson & Johnson's Janssen vaccine." [5]

The agency however also made the point of recommending that vaccinated individuals age 12 years and above should take "...booster shots at 5 months after the completion of the primary series of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine..." [6]

 So here's where the confusion comes in, if you're already "fully vaccinated" why do you need a booster? If you are immune as they say you should be, why does the CDC feel the need to recommend something that is not necessary?

If a person is fully vaccinated i.e. having immunity then what is the purpose of the boosters then? 

To cover up  the colossal failure of these new vaccines to provide immunity --real protection from disease-- they changed the definition for vaccines and vaccination, in order to justify use of the boosters. According to the CDC a vaccine no longer needs to provide immunity but instead stimulates the immune system. The agency originally defined vaccination as "the act of introducing a vaccine into the body to produce immunity to a specific disease."[7] Because of the COVID-19 pandemic the CDC definition replaced the word 'immunity' to 'providing protection'. 

Here's their new definition of the word vaccine. It reads like this: 

"a preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune response against diseases." [8]

This was the original:

"a product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease." [9] 

Indirectly, the CDC is telling us that we should not expect immunity from these vaccines, and it is not surprising. Is it? These vaccines have no immunity to give as is evidenced by the rising breakthrough cases.

Even 'The Lancet', a world renowned, peer reviewed journal highlighted that the vaccines provided no significant difference in preventing transmission in infected vaccinated persons compared to persons who are unvaccinated. [10]

In fact, they also noted that where viral load was concerned the "fully vaccinated" were capable of carrying the same amount of virus in their lungs as unvaccinated persons.

It said:

"...there is growing evidence that peak viral titres in the upper airways of the lungs and culturable virus are similar in vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals... recent investigation by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of an outbreak of COVID-19 in a prison in Texas showed the equal presence of infectious virus in the nasopharynx of vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals," (my emphasis added). [11]

So the CDC knew the truth, and now you do too.

What is the truth?

• The truth is you cannot receive complete protection against COVID-19 from the vaccines being administered.
• Breakthrough cases are evidence of this truth
• The CDC rewriting the definition of what a vaccine is and how it works is clear evidence that something is wrong
• The truth is that Israel is now on their 4th shot/second booster and that country has still not returned to normal because of these vaccines
• There is confusion as to who is considered fully vaccinated whether mRNA as in Pfizer and Moderna or DNA as in the case of Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca
• Neither primary dosage (2 dose vaccine or 1 shot vaccine as in the case of Janssen) or boosters work against omicron
• Vaccines' effectiveness wane over time (they only last for six months) and you are no more protected against Covid than a person who never took the jab
• The COVID-19 vaccines stimulate an immune response but provide no immunity

Recommendations?

Build your immune system naturally. Eat healthy, exercise, get enough sleep, take your vitamins and take precautions to secure your health. Natural immunity was always the way to go, and the scientists know this is true. Thanks so much for reading this exhaustive look at the Covid vaccines. I appreciate you for reading to the end. Please leave a comment below if you have a question or comment. Thanks

Updated February 19, 2022.

(New information added relating to US states offering booster shots and FDA approval)

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Terms & Definitions

mRNA - Messenger ribonucleic acid - It is a type of RNA that is used to carry DNA’s genetic code outside the cell nucleus so it can be used as the instructions to build protection.

Vaccine Effectiveness - A measure of how well vaccines work in the real world among the whole population.

viral load - a measure of the number of viral particles present in an organism or environment

viral titres - This refers to the concentration of infectious viral particles. Tests are done to detect how much of a virus is present to infect a cell.

culturable virus - A virus derived from a lab procedure in which samples of a virus are placed in different cells to observe its ability to infect. 

immunity - the ability of an organism to resist a particular infection or toxin to prevent illness by the action of specific antibodies or sensitized white blood cells.