A brief history of how CDC misrepresented the evidence on natural versus vaccine-induced immunity for COVID and ruined thousands of people's lives
In October 2021, the CDC published a meme claiming that the vaccinated are 5X more protected from COVID than those who are unvaccinated but who have been previously infected (Link).
This messaging was based on a study conducted by CDC with a very flawed study design, and with conclusions that strongly conflicted with better-designed research published from Israel several months before CDC made these claims (the Israeli study found 13X greater protection from previous infection compared to vaccination; link). This study was highlighted by Science in August of 2021 and was extremely well-known at the time.
In other words, CDC should have known better than to make such a strong claim, much less as a meme, given that stronger evidence showed the opposite. Yet, this claim led to policies that then led to vaccine mandates, job terminations, and social exclusion among unvaccinated people who had been previously infected; it ruined the professional and personal lives of thousands of people, for no scientifically supportable reason.
Martin Kulldorff at the time wrote a comprehensive critical analysis at the time bringing light to these issues (link); like the much better Israeli study, this article, which was far superior to what was being produced at CDC, was ignored by CDC, government officials, and policymakers.
CDC later reversed its position (link), and it is now widely accepted that the CDC was wrong (link). Despite this, CDC has ever apologized or explained what steps it will take to prevent something like this, which resulted in countless lives being ruined, from happening again in the future. This is the definition of a government institution that is not accountable to the people that it claims to serve.