Rand Paul Calls Omicron ‘Nature’s Vaccine,’ Claims It’s ‘Malpractice’ and ‘Not Good Science’ to Vaccinate Children

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said on Fox & Friends Wednesday that the Omicron variant of Covid-19 was “nature’s vaccine” and claimed it was “malpractice” and “not good science” to vaccinate children.

Paul made the comments in response to a question from host Lawrence Jones about Dr. Anthony Fauci and school policy, commenting that Fauci “knows what is happening from a mental health standpoint with the young people, so should he come out on the record and say kids need to be back in school?”

“He should but he won’t,” Paul replied, criticizing Fauci by claiming his “every impulse is to lock down things” and “tell us what we cannot do.”

“He is never based on the science,” the Kentucky senator continued, saying that Fauci had made a “huge mistake, an unforgivable mistake” by ignoring natural immunity, because millions of Americans have already gotten Covid, and “if you get this mild variant, the Omicron, it actually is going to protect you against the more serious variant.”

“This is basically nature’s vaccine that is running through the community,” said Paul.

Let’s pause and note that this is not an accurate statement, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine, which has this explanation of Covid natural immunity on their website, along with links to the referenced studies (emphasis added):

Natural immunity is the antibody protection your body creates against a germ once you’ve been infected with it. Natural immunity varies according to the person and the germ. For example, people who have had the measles are not likely to get it again, but this is not the case for every disease. A mild case of an illness may not result in strong natural immunity. New studies show that natural immunity to the coronavirus weakens (wanes) over time, and does so faster than immunity provided by COVID-19 vaccination.

Furthermore, the CDC has a science brief on their website comparing “SARS-CoV-2 Infection-induced and Vaccine-induced Immunity,” noting the following (selected excerpts from the brief’s executive summary; emphasis added):

• The immunity provided by vaccine and prior infection are both high but not complete (i.e., not 100%).
• Whereas there is a wide range in antibody titers in response to infection with SARS-CoV-2, completion of a primary vaccine series, especially with mRNA vaccines, typically leads to a more consistent and higher-titer initial antibody response.
• The body of evidence for infection-induced immunity is more limited than that for vaccine-induced immunity in terms of the quality of evidence (e.g., probable bias towards symptomatic or medically-attended infections) and types of studies (e.g., observational cohort studies, mostly retrospective versus a mix of randomized controlled trials, case-control studies, and cohort studies for vaccine-induced immunity). There are insufficient data to extend the findings related to infection-induced immunity at this time to persons with very mild or asymptomatic infection or children.
• Substantial immunologic evidence and a growing body of epidemiologic evidence indicate that vaccination after infection significantly enhances protection and further reduces risk of reinfection, which lays the foundation for CDC recommendations.

Paul’s commentary continued, saying that “some of our vulnerable people” may still “suffer and die from this” and we “should be trying to protect the vulnerable,” but Fauci was a “one-size-fits-all, let’s vaccinate the newborns and vaccinate all the kids.”

This not an accurate statement. The current CDC guidelines only include recommendations for vaccinations for children 5 years of age or older, not newborns. The CDC website plainly says none of the three Covid-19 vaccines currently authorized (Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, or Johnson & Johnson) are authorized for children under 5. Fauci has not made recommendations in conflict with the CDC.

“The thing is that’s not good science,” said Paul, calling it “actually malpractice to force a booster” on a 15-year-old boy “without knowing whether they have been infected previously,” because of the risk of myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle.

Again, the CDC website discusses the risks of myocarditis and pericarditis, an inflammation of the outer lining of the heart, after receiving a Covid-19 vaccine, noting that the risk of both is rare, “[m]ost patients with myocarditis or pericarditis who received care responded well to medicine and rest and felt better quickly,” and the “known risks of COVID-19 illness and its related, possibly severe complications, such as long-term health problems, hospitalization, and even death far outweigh the potential risks of having a rare adverse reaction to vaccination, including the possible risk of myocarditis or pericarditis.”

Watch the video above, via Fox News.