COVID Vaccines are Non-Sterilizing and Can Lead to More Infectious Variants

Posted on by Jesse Santiano, M.D.
This article looks at new research from the Emerging Pathogens Institute of the University of Florida. The authors wanted to know if fully vaccinated people can get sick with the Delta variant and spread it to others.
The study was published as a preprint in medRxiv. This research is different from other studies because they counted the actual viral particles in the samples and did not rely on the cycle threshold of the PCR. Their method gives a more accurate count of the SARS-CoV-2 from the patients.
They also sequenced all of their 4,439 samples, allowing them to know what variants spread across Alachua Country in Florida from October 05, 2020, to August 06, 2021.
The result showed that vaccinated people can still have breakthrough infections as early as three months after vaccination.
And while the viral load of the unvaccinated is higher than the vaccinated by 38%,
49-50% of all breakthroughs and 56-60% of Delta-infected breakthroughs had enough viral loads to be infectious. 
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Areas of Transmission
COVID-19 symptoms from the most common
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Areas of Transmission

The most common places where people get infected are in their households (54.2%), followed by the community (37.5%). Healthcare-related exposure is only 6.3%.

COVID-19 symptoms from the most common

  1. Runny nose 72.5%
  2. Fatigue 54 %
  3. Headache 53%
  4. Dry cough 47%
  5. Sore throat 40%
  6. Loss of smell 35%
  7. Loss of taste 34%
  8. Productive cough  18%
  9. Shortness of breath 14%
Overall, this study suggests that the current vaccines (Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson and Johnson) do not provide sterilizing immunity. The SARS-CoV-2 will continue to persist and possibly mutate to more infectious, deadlier, or vaccine-resistant variants. The authors said,
The continuous circulation of SARS-CoV-2 among unvaccinated individuals, as well as vaccinated who, albeit protected from severe disease, are susceptible from infection and can potentially contribute to further transmission, provides the virus the chance to continue exploring the fitness landscape and accumulating mutations that may eventually result in the emergence of even more transmissible/ pathogenic or vaccine-resistant strains.

 

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Reference:
Magalis et al. SARS-CoV-2 Delta vaccine breakthrough transmissibility in Alachua, Florida.
medRxiv 2021.11.10.21266134; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.11.10.21266134