That doesn't make sense. A major discussion in the public since Covid caught on was about herd immunity -- and that infection would drive some of this. Maybe the concern is that we aren't inclusive of natural immunity in our policies. But that is purely an issue of bureaucratic process (for example, there should be no false positives in administering a vaccine) and incentives (we don't want people to try to get infected since infected people can transmit the virus), not any statement about the science related to natural immunity.
To be fair, the herd immunity idea was floated around quite early in beginning of the pandemic. But it was quickly thrown out when governments saw the infection rates and deaths spike up. Ever since, vaccination has been the dominant (hammer) solution for the virus. (Vaccination) Has been the background track for this pandemic and still is to date. Natural immunity is only coming back because Omicron is not as deadly as the previous strains. It was never an option before.
Exactly. The incentives didn't line up for natural immunity as a course for herd immunity. It wasn't about the science, but policy. And it was never an argument about the science (besides science trying to understand the delta between different types of immunity, including different types of vaccines and natural immunity). That's why I'm perplexed about the "conspiracy" talk. No more than there's a conspiracy about wine consumption in the US.
It doesn't make sense if you are actually following the science and not The Science like politicians are. Over 2021, natural immunity was dropped so hard in the US that the vaccine passports/requirements popping up here make no allowances for recovery from covid - it's vaccination or nothing.
