As an anecdote, that's exactly the behaviour/mentality I've heard from some people I know that still refuse to take the vaccine. They are young and fit, and their reasoning is exactly that, it's easier to just get infected, recover, and get papers for traveling that are valid for 6 months...
It's a gamble. I'd rather benefit from all the readily available medical science developments before I get infected. In Europe getting infected is generally only valid for 180 days for travel. From what I know only Hungary would grant longer recovery certificates based on an antibody test.
I wouldn't expose myself if I was immunologically naive to sars-cov-2, but I am happy to have had it before the vaccination as I was exposed to a more varied and wide antigenic sample than the one from the vaccines I got.
Given antigenic imprinting phenomenons I am happy to have been introduced to the natural virus first.
That's precisely what Herr Drosten, German top virologist and a member of state anti-Covid team suggested, to get infected after second shot to get a permanent immunity with a low-risk profile.
Unfortunately, Germany bought too many vaccines, and they need to use them all to be able to buy even more.
Claiming that some scientist or study stated something or other is not useful unless context is provided. At least it should be clear when it was said, since the position of science is subject to change as new data is available or the situation changes.
The quote that you probably refer to, is this one, from 3 Sep 2021 (translation by deepl):
"My goal as a virologist Drosten how I would like to become immune now is: I want to have a vaccine immunity and then saddling on top of that I definitely want to have my first general infection and the second and the third at some point. I have resigned myself to that for a long time. And then I know, I'm immune for a really long time and I'll only see this virus every few years, just like I see the other coronaviruses every now and then. As a relatively healthy adult, I can take responsibility for that. There are other populations that can't. But I can only answer for myself, for my own health, because I am now twice vaccinated. And I have to admit, I would also like to be vaccinated a third time."
On 9 Nov 2021, he's on the record with this (translation by deepl):
"One can debate whether one has grasped this correctly at the beginning. I think that the plan to work with two doses at the beginning was correct. Because what changed here was the virus. But now we just have to acknowledge, the vaccine is not specifically targeted to the delta virus, but to a virus that is not even circulating today. The virus has changed."
So definitely a preference for more than 2 shots and not suggesting that anyone do this, other than he himself, personally, given his specific risk profile.
Is his stance on delta equally valid in light of the new omicron variant? Maybe, maybe not?
I wouldn’t call it more durable, but it can be more diverse/flexible (there’s more to covid-19 than a specific spike sequence).
But if it was more durable (long-lasting), they wouldn’t have the 180d limit. They put that limit in because of the (lowwwww) risk of continuing to test positive after recovery, but the worst case report I’ve seen is in the 6 week after recovery range.
It’s mostly Canada trying to be punitive when it comes to travelling by requiring PCR, when a within-24h antigen test would be cheap, easy, catch as many asymptomatic cases as a less-fresh PCR, and near zero-risk of false positives immediately after recovery.
Please cite your supporting sources for that assertion. What I have been hearing does not support that, and even seems to be slightly the opposite (but not a lot of weight on those).