Exposed: Health Officials Suppressed Superior Natural Immunity Data to Enforce Vaccine Mandates

August 16, 2025 - Newly uncovered emails expose how top pandemic officials, including Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins, deliberately downplayed evidence that natural immunity from prior COVID-19 infections outperformed vaccines in preventing reinfection, prioritizing a vaccination-only narrative despite contradictory science.

In August 2021, the CDC issued a press release claiming a Kentucky study proved vaccines provided better protection than previous infections. The headline blared: "New CDC Study: Vaccination Offers Higher Protection than Previous COVID-19 Infection." However, the actual MMWR report, titled "Reduced Risk of Reinfection with SARS-CoV-2 After COVID-19 Vaccination — Kentucky, May–June 2021," only examined reinfection risks among those already infected earlier. It found unvaccinated previously infected individuals had 2.34 times higher odds of reinfection compared to their vaccinated counterparts, but made no broad comparison to natural immunity in the uninfected.

NIH Director Collins amplified this distortion on Fox News, stating vaccines definitively offered superior protection over infection-acquired antibodies. This fueled mandates, ignoring the study's limited scope.

Weeks later, an Israeli study from Maccabi Health Services, published August 25, 2021, on medRxiv, revealed the opposite: natural immunity provided longer-lasting, stronger defense against Delta variant infection, symptoms, and hospitalization than two Pfizer doses. Analyzing over 700,000 records, it showed previously infected unvaccinated people were 13 times less likely to get infected than vaccinated never-infected individuals.

Emails obtained via FOIA by Protect the Public’s Trust show Surgeon General Vivek Murthy flagged the study to Fauci, Collins, and others on August 27, 2021. Fauci called the data "impressive," suggesting severe prior infections might yield immunity surpassing vaccination. Collins labeled it "puzzling," questioning the vaccine-superiority claim.

CDC's John Brooks reviewed it positively, praising its design and concluding vaccine effectiveness waned faster than natural immunity, which lasted longer and offered better protection up to six months. Yet, Brooks advised against publicizing this, arguing infection-induced immunity came at "too great a cost" and vaccination remained safer.

No messaging updates followed. A October 2021 CDC brief dismissed observational studies like Israel's as lower quality, favoring vaccine data. Only in January 2022 did CDC data acknowledge prior infection reduced hospitalization risks similarly to vaccination during Delta, with hybrid immunity strongest. By then, mandates had eroded freedoms and trust.

Protect the Public’s Trust, which filed a 2021 scientific integrity complaint, views this as narrative-driven suppression. Director Michael Chamberlain stated the real cost was shattered faith in institutions, potentially irreparable.

This revelation aligns with broader pandemic scrutiny, including Fauci's January 2025 pardon by Biden and reports on vaccine policy's unintended harms like eroded confidence. Later studies, including a 2023 PMC analysis, found natural and vaccine immunity equivalent in preventing severe outcomes.