A federal judge on Oct. 8 denied a request to block Michigan State University’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate on the basis of natural immunity.
An employee at the school, Jeanna Norris, filed a lawsuit against the mandate and asked a judge to intervene on the basis that she had already contracted COVID-19 and recovered. She presented two antibody tests showing her previous infection, while her doctors told her that she didn’t need to get the vaccine at this time.
Despite the natural immunity, Norris faces termination from Michigan State University for not complying with the school’s mandate that all students and staff get the shot unless they have a medical or religious exemption.
U.S. District Judge Paul Maloney, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, declined her lawsuit. The mandate, Maloney said, didn’t violate her fundamental rights and pointed to a previous Supreme Court ruling in 1905.
“This Court must apply the law from the Supreme Court: Jacobson essentially applied rational basis review and found that the vaccine mandate was rational in ‘protect[ing] the public health and public safety,’” Maloney said in his order. “The Court cannot ignore this binding precedent.”
Some studies have shown that natural immunity afforded by a previous COVID-19 infection provides longer-lasting and stronger protection against COVID-19. An Israel study published in August compared individuals who had a previous infection with those who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and found their “analysis demonstrated that natural immunity affords longer-lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease, and hospitalization due to the Delta variant.”
“This is the largest real-world observational study comparing natural immunity, gained through previous SARS-CoV-2 infection, to vaccine-induced immunity, afforded by the BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine,” the study said.
Lawyers for Norris told the Washington Times that she is considering legal alternatives.
This is an excerpt from The Epoch Times.
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