Israeli Study Finds Covid Recovery Protects Better Than Vaccine

Which affords better protection against COVID-19 — two doses of the Pfizer vaccine, or having recovered from the virus?

The answer, according to a study conducted in Israel, appears to be that those who have recovered from the virus are far less likely to contract it again than those who received the two doses but never were infected, according to Bloomberg.

The study, described as the “largest real-world analysis comparing natural immunity to protection provided by vaccine” showed that reinfection is far less common. People given both doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine were almost six times more likely to contract a delta infection than those who had previously recovered from COVID.

The findings conflict with earlier studies, which showed that immunizations offer better protection, which will necessitate further study.

The earlier research did not look at the delta variant.

The researchers analyzed the medical records of tens of thousands of coronavirus patients, charting their infections, symptoms, and hospitalizations between the beginning of June and Aug. 14, when the delta variant emerged in Israel.

The Israel study has not yet been peer-reviewed.