NEWS FEED: “Athletes who had COVID will be considered ‘fully vaccinated,’ NCAA says in new guidelines”
The NCAA on Thursday released its new COVID-19 guidance for winter sports, and the guidance contains some important news.
As ESPN reports, the NCAA’s COVID-19 Medical Advisory Group updated its definition of “fully vaccinated” to account for various new vaccinations, boosters, and immunity factors.
“Fully vaccinated individuals now include those within two months of receiving the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, five months of receiving the Pfizer vaccine series or six months of receiving the Moderna vaccine series;” reports ESPN staff writer Jeff Borzello, “and individuals who are beyond the aforementioned timeline and have received the booster vaccine.”
But perhaps the biggest development came in the following line.
“Individuals within 90 days of a documented COVID-19 infection fall within the equivalent of ‘fully vaccinated.’”
Natural Immunity Is Now Considered Fully Vaccinated by NCAA
In many parts of the world, including the United States, vaccine passports are required for travel.
Vaccine passports are morally dubious for several reasons, but they seem particularly unjust for people who’ve already had COVID-19, since they’ve already been exposed to the virus and have acquired natural immunity. Some evidence, such as a medical study out of Israel published in October, suggests that people with natural immunity actually have more protection from COVID-19 than vaccinated individuals.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Director of the National Institutes of Health and the Chief Medical Advisor to the President, was recently asked on CNN about the Israeli study—specifically if people naturally infected with COVID-19 had a lower risk of contracting the virus than those who received the vaccine. He declined to give a clear answer.
“I don’t have a really firm answer for you on that,” Fauci said. “That’s something that we’re going to have to discuss regarding the durability of the response.”