I'm shocked at the number of people recovered from COVID who won't get the vaccine.

[Throck]

I keep my ears open in public, a number of people have tested positive for COVID and recovered, they stated specifically they will NOT get the vaccine. To boot, with no vaccine they are not wearing masks.

[zaj]

1. Herd immunity includes infected people too.

[Act_of_Reparation]

6. Not as much as you'd think.

[Throck]

9. CDC has a different opinion. That's the confusion.

[LisaL]

17. The reason those infected are still recommended to get a vaccine is that

natural immunity from covid is likely not very long lasting. The amount of antibodies in formerly infected people vary widely. So those formerly infected aren't necessarily immune, especially against the variants.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

2. I know two such people. Only one of them is a wingnut with weird fantasies

about what it might do to them. The other's my ex-wife, and she's pretty liberal, but isn't going to get it. I don't really know why other than she said she's had C19 so doesn't think she needs it. What's funny is her parents are total RW Faux watchers, but they got theirs.

[LonePirate]

3. It's the long-ingrained chicken pox mentality with anti-vax and RW lies mixed in.

[nuxvomica]

7. And yet I got the shingrix shots despite being "immune" to the virus

I see what you're saying, like how people held chicken-pox parties to get their kids exposed and over it, but even the chicken-pox is not a good example because it re-emerges later in life as the shingles.

[Ms. Toad]

11. For most significant viruses

having the disease does create immunity (polio, smallpox, measles, mumps, rubella, rubeolla, etc.).

COVID may be more like the diseases that mutate from year to year (influenza, colds). So a problem with trusting COVID to prevent future infections with COVID is that it may not be the same COVID next time around. So just like you can get colds year after year - that may be possible with COVID as well. We just don't know yet - although we do know that there have been cases of COVID that are reinfections.

Chicken pox is in a class all its own, in that the virus hangs around for decades, only to materialize later as shingles (with no new exposure).

[LonePirate]

14. I used chicken pox as it is a common virus ailment in the US which people are afflicted with once.

US citizens don’t contract the others (except for measles and sometimes mumps) nowadays because people have been vaccinated against them and used to vaccinate their kids against them, although that is changing unfortunately. Still, the mindset of “I can catch it only once” persists with this virus and probably will for many years to come.

[Ms. Toad]

15. It is generally true that you can catch chicken pox only once.

Shingles, same virus, doesn't require a second exposure - so it isn't really catching it twice.

But, until proven differently, people need to treat COVID as a family of illnesses (like colds and influenza) rather than like discrete illnesses (like chicken pox, measles, mumps, etc.) Having had a cold, or influenza once, doesn't necessarly make you immune to the cousin when it comes around.

[ananda]

4. Same experience here.

They think they are immune or safe to others.

I've pressed them to get it, but that's all I can do.

[Raftergirl]

5. They are likely immune to original virus

but not to the variants, including Delta, which is spreading in the US. The vaccinated, OTOH, are protected against Delta, according to data coming out of the UK.

[Hugin]

8. An interesting metric to know would be...

of those refusing the vaccination how many of them had mild or the so-called asymptomatic (yet to be determined) cases?

[dawg]

10. They come into my office without a mask and say ...

"It's ok, I've already had Covid."

I just think, "Hope you survive it next time you get it too."

[Treefrog]

12. You really hear THAT many conversations about others' health in public?

SO many that you’re “shocked” at the number? Damn, I never hear any of this anywhere I go.

[Throck]

13. People will comment on not wearing mask.

The response is I've had Covid last year and I'm good.

[Treefrog]

16. Ah.

Alrightie then.