Post vaccination infection rare but possibly contagious; Vaccines appear safe for 'long COVID' survivors

Published May 27, 2021 05:22 AM By NANCY LAPID Reuters

The following is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus.

Post vaccination infection rare, but potentially contagious

As of April 30, when roughly 101 million Americans had been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, "breakthrough" infections

had been reported in 0.01% of them, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported on Tuesday.

Roughly 27% of breakthrough infections were asymptomatic, while in 2% of cases, patients died. The CDC had genetic data for virus samples from 555 breakthrough infections.

Mutated variants of the coronavirus, including those first seen in the UK and South Africa, accounted for 64% of the breakthroughs.

In a separate study posted Tuesday on medRxiv ahead of peer review, researchers reported that among 20 fully-vaccinated healthcare workers with breakthrough COVID-19 cases, all were infected with variants.

An earlier study had linked breakthrough infections with low viral loads, suggesting low transmission risks, but "we found many samples in our breakthrough cohort with high viral load," said coauthor Pavitra Roychoudhury of the University of Washington.

"Our work suggests that not all breakthrough infections are at low risk of initiating transmission and, if they did, these infections could lead to the continued spread of variants of concern, particularly in areas with low vaccination rates."

Vaccines appear safe for "long COVID" survivors

COVID-19 survivors with lingering symptoms can safely be vaccinated against the coronavirus, a small study suggests.

Researchers tracked 36 individuals with "long COVID" who had been hospitalized while acutely ill and who later received at least one dose of either the Pfizer/BioNTech or AstraZeneca vaccine.

Eight months after admission to the hospital, and before vaccination, participants had at least one lingering symptom and half had at least four symptoms.

Before vaccination, their quality-of-life was "markedly reduced" from normal, the researchers reported on Monday in Annals of Internal Medicine.

One month after vaccination, 71% of their symptoms remained unchanged, 23% of their symptoms were improved, and 6% of symptoms had worsened. There was no significant worsening in quality-of-life or mental well-being, and outcomes were similar with both vaccines, researchers reported.

The results may reassure people with persistent COVID-19 symptoms that the different types of vaccines developed by Pfizer/BioNTech or AstraZeneca are "not associated with a decrease in quality of life or worsening of symptoms," the researchers said. -- Reuters

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