NEW YORK: He is completely vaccinated against coronavirus. Now what? Do not expect to throw off your mask and return to normal activities immediately.
This will be a disappointment, if not a shock, to many people.
In Miami, 81-year-old Noemi Caraballo received her second dose on Tuesday and hopes to see friends, resume fitness classes and do refills after nearly a year of being extremely cautious, even ordering groceries online.
“Her line is,‘ I’m sick of talking to cats and parrots, ’” her daughter Susan Caraballo said. “He wants to do things and talk to people.”
But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has not yet changed its guidelines: at least for now, people should follow the same rules as everyone else to wear a mask, keep a distance of 6 feet, and avoid congestion. , even after they got it they got their second dose of vaccine.
The vaccines used so far require two doses and experts say they mostly don’t need a guard after the first dose.
“You’re asking a very logical question,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top American infectious disease expert, said when a 91-year-old California woman recently asked if she and her vaccinated friends could resume their games. mah-jongg.
In this online broadcast exchange, Fauci was only able to point out the recommendations of the CDC, which so far are mother on the exceptions for the meeting of vaccinated people. “Wait,” she told the woman, saying she expected updates to the guidelines as more people receive the desired shots.
What experts also need to learn: Vaccines are highly effective in preventing symptomatic COVID-19, especially serious illness and death, but no one still knows to what extent they block the spread of coronavirus.
It’s great if the vaccine means that someone who would otherwise have been hospitalized only has odors or even no symptoms. But “the question that comes up,” Fauci said during a briefing on the White House coronavirus response last week, is whether an infected person despite vaccination can unintentionally infect someone else.
Studies are underway to find out and clues are beginning to emerge. Fauci noted recent research in Spain showing that the more coronavirus an infected person has (what is called a viral load), the more infectious they are. This is not surprising, as it happens with other diseases.
Some preliminary findings from Israel have suggested that infected people after the first dose of vaccine, when only partially protected, had lower viral loads than unvaccinated people who became infected. This is encouraging if conclusions are maintained. Israel has vaccinated a large portion of its population and scientists around the world are watching how the outbreak responds as these inoculations increase.
It is also crucial to monitor whether vaccines protect against new mutated versions of the virus that are spreading rapidly in some countries, Dr. Walter Orenstein, an infectious disease expert at Emory University. He has been vaccinated and is scrupulously following CDC guidelines.
There are practical reasons. “It’s hard to know who got vaccinated and who didn’t, if you just walk through the grocery store,” noted University of Pennsylvania immunologist E. John Wherry.
And experts like Wherry are repeatedly asked: yes, there are rules for being in public, but what can grandma do at home, with family or close friends, after getting vaccinated?
Vaccines don’t boost everyone’s immune system, so someone with cancer or frail seniors may not get as much protection as a robust 70-year-old.
But most people should feel “safer going shopping, for example, going to see their grandchildren or giving a hug to their daughter,” Wherry said.
This is because the chances of a fully vaccinated person becoming seriously ill, even if they are not zero, are low.
“Friends who come to dinner, we should try to follow the guidelines,” Wherry added. “You never know who’s involved, where the vaccine may not work so well.”
What if fully vaccinated people are exposed to an infected person? Recently, the CDC facilitated these rules: there is no quarantine as long as the vaccinated person has no symptoms and has spent at least two weeks but no more than three months since their second dose.
Get on a plane? Vaccinated or not, the CDC still urges only to travel essentially.
International travel is an even tougher prospect. Expect countries that already have different quarantine and testing requirements to reach different post-vaccination guidelines, especially because multiple types of vaccines are used around the world, some more proven than others. There is also the concern to bring these worrying mutations from one country to another.
Stay tuned for advice updates as more people get vaccinated. In the meantime, don’t underestimate the importance for vaccinated people of feeling less anxious about making recommendations or going to work while following public health measures, said Dr. Luciana Borio, a former scientist with the Food and Drug Administration.
Even with a trip to the grocery store, “there was always this anxiety about,‘ Was this the contact that would make me infected? “This is a very powerful change in his life situation,” Borio said.
Associated Press reporter Kelli Kennedy in Miami contributed to this report.
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