The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is clarifying claims made by the agency’s director that people vaccinated against COVID-19 will not be infected with the coronavirus or spread to others.
In an interview with Rachel Maddow of MSNBC earlier this week, CDC director Rochelle Walensky cited a study by the agency released on Monday that found that people who received both doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine were 90 percent less likely to be infected with the virus.
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“We can almost see the end,” Walensky told Maddow. “We are vaccinating so fast that our CDC data today suggests, you know, that vaccinated people do not carry the virus, do not get sick and that it is not just in clinical tests, but also in the real world.”
Walensky went on to emphasize the importance of vaccinated people to continue wearing masks and social detachment.
The statement, however, drew criticism from some scientists who said that although the transmission of vaccinated people may be unlikely, there is insufficient data to claim that the vaccinees are fully protected and cannot carry the virus and spread it to others.
“It is much more difficult for vaccinated people to be infected, but don’t think for a second that they cannot be infected,” said Paul Duprex, director of the Vaccine Research Center at the University of Pittsburgh. The New York Times.
“If Dr. Walensky had said that most vaccinated people do not carry viruses, we would not be having this discussion,” John Moore, a virologist at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York, told the channel.
“What we do know is that vaccines are substantially effective against infection – there is more and more data about it – but nothing is 100 percent.”
The CDC later told the Times that Walensky was speaking widely during the interview.
“It is possible that some people who are fully vaccinated may receive COVID-19. The evidence is unclear whether they can spread the virus to others. We continue to evaluate the evidence, ”a CDC spokesman told the Times.
The CDC study found that the two mRNA vaccines prevented 90 percent of infections two weeks after patients received the second of two doses, including asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic infections. After a single dose of any of the vaccines, the participants’ risk of infection dropped by 80%.
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