‘THIS IS HUGE’: CDC says fully vaccinated individuals don’t have to quarantine after potential COVID-19 exposure
Dr. Megan Ranney is hailing the move by the federal agency.
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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday for the first time updated guidelines for individuals who have been fully vaccinated to state they no longer have to quarantine after being exposed to someone with COVID-19.
Dr. Megan Ranney, an Rhode Island emergency room physician and director of the Brown Lifespan Center for Digital Health, hailed the move as significant, explaining in a thread on Twitter the importance of the update.
“THIS IS HUGE,” she wrote.
The update is “justified,” the doctor said, since it has been known for some time that the COVID-19 vaccines protect the person who has gotten the vaccination from severe illness.
“A big, unanswered question has been whether the vaccine also protects those AROUND you from getting sick,” Ranney said. “Some new data suggests that it does.”
According to the doctor, there is emerging research that shows that in people who have “a breakthrough infection” despite being vaccinated, those individuals may have lower levels of the virus, making them less likely to transmit it to someone else.
“Now, at the end of the day, many of us suspect these vaccines will be similar to those of other vaccines-against-common-viruses (eg, chicken pox): It will reduce-but-not-eliminate the chance of both getting really sick, & the chance of getting others sick,” Ranney wrote. “The good news, though is that will be enough to stop the horror we’re living through.”
The updated CDC guidance states the new instruction applies to individuals who have been fully vaccinated within the three months following their final dose, and only as long as the individual has remained asymptomatic since their exposure to COVID-19. The CDC said inpatients and residents in health care settings who are fully vaccinated should still continue to quarantine after a potential exposure to the virus.
Individuals who are vaccinated are still required to wear masks and following other social distancing guidelines to prevent spread of the virus.
My text messages are full of questions from folks: Is this justified? Why this change?
Now, I’m not part of CDC. But here’s my read –> yes, this is justified. And here’s why.
— Megan Ranney MD MPH 🌻 (@meganranney) February 11, 2021
1) New preprint from Israel (not yet peer-reviewed, and small dataset):
A 4-fold decrease in viral load among those who happen to have a breakthrough infection, among those who have been vaccinated.
SO PROMISING – bc viral load <-> infectiousnesshttps://t.co/T2hXcfewAm pic.twitter.com/ZtqgG6Fh5Q
— Megan Ranney MD MPH 🌻 (@meganranney) February 11, 2021
2) Data last week from @AstraZeneca suggesting that their shot reduces not just the # of people who get sick, but also the # who test positive on weekly swabs.https://t.co/0fqN3quljk
— Megan Ranney MD MPH 🌻 (@meganranney) February 11, 2021
3) Finally, some data from @moderna_tx released to FDA during the EUA process (PDF link below, see page 7) supports that their vaccine, too, reduces not just severe disease, not just symptomatic disease – but also infection by SARS-CoV2, PERIOD.https://t.co/jsVC9Pv5bs
— Megan Ranney MD MPH 🌻 (@meganranney) February 11, 2021
The good news, though is that will be enough to stop the horror we’re living through.
(Assuming vaccines maintain ~70% efficacy against the new variants, AND either 80% of adults are vaccinated, and/or ppl keep following #MaskUp recommendations for now)https://t.co/sxdulsrARI
— Megan Ranney MD MPH 🌻 (@meganranney) February 11, 2021
https://twitter.com/meganranney/status/1359671403314900992
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