Disease specialists say most immune systems need six months to build up their defenses between a COVID-19 infection and a booster shot.
report, researchers found that people who have had COVID-19 are more protected than people who have been vaccinated but have not previously had COVID-19. Compared to those unvaccinated who had not had COVID, people who were vaccinated had a significantly lower risk of developing symptomatic COVID-19 both pre-Omicron variant and during the Omicron variant phase, which is currently the dominant coronavirus variant, researchers reported.
Just like the flu vaccine that’s intended to prevent hospitalization and death, the coronavirus vaccine is designed to prevent people from dying or needing to be hospitalized. Thestudy published in July showed those who were unvaccinated who had not had coronavirus were at the highest risk for getting it.
For the general population, the question about whether to get the booster shot if you’ve had coronavirus within the past six months or received the vaccine comes down to risk tolerance. “If you want to play it safe, after six months is fine,” Shrestha says. “If you are able to tolerate a little bit of risk, I don’t see a downside to waiting a year if you’ve had COVID and you’ve recovered. Not everyone agrees.