What is the risk of getting COVID-19 after being fully vaccinated?
Although covid vaccines are very effective, none offer 100 percent protection. While they occur cases of infection in vaccinated, are extremely rare, and in most cases, these infections only cause mild illness.
The risk of being hospitalized or dying as a result of an infection for someone who has been vaccinated is miniscule (less than 0.003 percent), according to the data collected by CDC. By June 21, more than 150 million people in the United States had been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. As of that date, the CDC reported that 4,115 patients had suffered cases of infection after being vaccinated against COVID-19 that had resulted in hospitalization or death, including 3,907 who had been hospitalized and 750 who died.
But because the risk of contracting COVID-19 after vaccination is not zero, some health experts continue to advise that vaccinated people take reasonable precautions, such as wearing a mask in crowded spaces.
People who live in areas with low vaccination rates may also consider wearing masks in public, where they are more likely to encounter an unvaccinated person than someone who lives in a highly vaccinated region.
In the United States, 64 percent of people age 12 and older have received at least one dose and 54 percent are fully vaccinated. However, in some cities like Seattle and San Francisco, more than 75 percent of those who qualify are at least partially vaccinated. Many states in the Northeast, West, and Pacific Northwest have vaccinated more than 60 percent of the adult population. But the rate of vaccination varies in the United States. Several southern states, such as Mississippi, Tennessee, Alabama, and Arkansas, have vaccinated less than 45 percent of adults. You can get more information at Times Vaccine Tracker.
Paul Offit, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and a member of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Vaccine Advisory Panel, is fully vaccinated, but still wears a mask when riding the bus in Philadelphia, because the rules require it, as well as when you are in a closed and crowded space. He puts on the mask when he goes to the supermarket, because he does not know the vaccination status of the other buyers. But you also dine in restaurants, as long as the tables are at least one meter apart and the waiters wear masks.
And while the risk of infection with the virus for fully vaccinated people is very low, Offit says the risk increases when in a community where most people are not vaccinated, because it creates more opportunities to meet with the virus. He cites a study conducted in the Netherlands on measles vaccine, which, like the covid vaccine, offers high levels of protection, which revealed that an unvaccinated person was safer in a highly vaccinated community than an immunized person in an area with low vaccination rates.
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