In response, the TN government filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court on 03 Jan 2022, justifying its notification. While the Honourable Supreme Court will decide on the legal merit of the affidavit, we examine here the scientific correctness of the claims made in the affidavit.The main justification offered by the TN affidavit is that unvaccinated people can be virus carriers, but not the vaccinated. Such a claim is doubly wrong scientifically. First, the claim that unvaccinated people are a threat is emphatically false, because at this time most Indians have already been exposed to the virus and have recovered naturally. Even as of Aug 2021, a serological survey releaved that as much as 70% of people in TN, and as high as 82% of Chennai residents were already exposed and had antibodies. After Omicron, this percentage is likely to be well above 90% now.Furthermore, it is well known that the protection offered by immunity after natural infection is robust, and various studies have confirmed this. For instance, a study in Israel found that immunity after natural infection is 13 times stronger than immunity after vaccination. Even the US’s CDC recently released a study which found that protection against infection is much stronger in the case of immunity from natural exposure and recovery, than from vaccination. The protection from natural immunity was strong even against the Delta variant, while vaccine-induced immunity had waned over time.Second, the claim that vaccinated people are safe to be around is contradicted by the government’s own protocols. Even a layperson knows by now that Covid-19 vaccination does not prevent infection, or transmission from that person to others after infection.
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