I agree with your last statement, but that is 20/20 hindsight.

The media played up reinfections tremendously last year and even though there was no data, I think it impacted politicians/public health policy makers to err on the side of caution.

The interesting thing is the vaccine was never tested in previously infected individuals and that could have been a contraindication for vaccination.

As a horror writer I cannot help but imagine moralizing scenarios where in the west, we vaccinate and lockdown and hoard vaccine and have immunity from vaccines, while in the Global South and places forced to reach herd immunity are realized to be immune to all variants while we must race to make and inject ourselves with boosters against each new variant. A variant arrives that is even more deadly and it wipes us out while the Global South survives better and ascends. I'm always writing stories!