Doctor: It is preferable to be vaccinated than to suffer from covid-19 1:23
(CNN) -
A covid-19 vaccine does not provide complete or immediate protection, which means it is still possible to become infected and test positive for the virus.
It happened to Democratic Rep. Stephen Lynch from Massachusetts: he tested positive after receiving his second dose of the Pfizer vaccine.
Hall of Fame basketball coach Rick Pitino, who coaches the men's team at Iona College in New York, also tested positive after receiving his first dose.
They could have tested positive for a number of reasons.
There is a delay between vaccination and protection
It takes a few days to a few weeks for the vaccine to work, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
You could test positive before the vaccine went off.
"It takes time for the immune response to develop," said Dr. Robert Salata, director of the Center for Travel Medicine and Global Health at Roe Green University Hospitals in Cleveland.
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The first dose may provide some protection, but as Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel said Monday, "we don't really have any data to prove it at this point."
For Pfizer, after 14 days, the first dose was about 52% effective in preventing illness, said Salata, who was the principal investigator for the Pfizer vaccine at his hospital.
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The vaccine prevents most, but not all, diseases
You can still test positive after getting vaccinated, since the vaccine is not 100% effective.
The two vaccines licensed in the US are very effective but do not provide full protection.
The Pfizer vaccine was 95% effective in preventing disease in clinical trials after people received two doses.
The Moderna vaccine was 94% effective in preventing disease in people who received two doses in clinical trials.
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The vaccine prevents the disease, but it is not clear if the infection
The vaccine prevents the disease, but it is not yet clear whether the vaccine prevents all infections or to what extent.
“The information is less clear if vaccines will prevent the virus from infecting us and if we can remain symptom-free.
That is still under study, ”said Dr. William Schaffner, infectious disease specialist and professor of preventive medicine in the Department of Health Policy at Vanderbilt University.
"From what we've seen, these vaccines really are a game changer to prevent disease and even its severity," said Namandje Bumpus, director of the department of pharmacology and molecular sciences at Johns Hopkins University.
"But focusing on the number of effectiveness does not paint the whole picture, because you could still end up with covid, but by all the indications that seem, those cases are still really less serious than unvaccinated people and that's really important.
Vaccine manufacturers are still studying whether vaccines simply keep people from getting really sick or fully protect against infection.
If you are asymptomatic, you will still test positive for covid-19.
That would also mean that even if you are vaccinated, you could also transmit the disease.
That is why even the vaccinated will have to wear masks.
A person could be an asymptomatic carrier and have the virus in their nasal passages, so when you breathe, speak, or sneeze, you can still transmit the new coronavirus to other people.
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Vaccines don't work retroactively
Vaccines do not work retroactively.
You could test positive because you were infected before you got the vaccine and you just didn't know it yet.
That's what happened to some of the healthcare workers in a study released Monday by the CDC.
The study found that 22 of 4,081 vaccinated healthcare workers tested positive for COVID-19 after receiving their first dose.
One of the study's authors, Dr. Eyal Leshem of the Sheba Medical Center in Israel, said it was clear that some of the workers who tested positive "were actually infected with covid before they received their first dose."
The variant question
There is concern that certain variants that have been spreading in the US may be less susceptible to the protection that comes from vaccines.
Preliminary laboratory data shows that vaccines should provide protection, and public health leaders want to vaccinate as many people as quickly as possible to limit the opportunities for the virus to mutate.
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Manufacturers of the covid-19 vaccine said they are testing to see if the vaccines work against the variants and are also working on boosters that would add additional protection against the variants.
"It is possible that within a year you will receive a flu shot in one arm and a covid update booster in the other," Schaffner said.
“We will have to adapt to what this virus is doing.
And we have the ability to keep up with the virus, and even get ahead of ourselves.
covid-19 vaccine