The week
COVID-19 vaccines appear to cause a sharp drop in infections in groups of Israeli and American health professionals
Three separate studies with healthcare professionals in the American and Israeli healthcare systems suggested that COVID-19 vaccinations are having a positive effect. The studies, all published Tuesday in The New England Journal of Medicine, suggest that vaccinations have played a role in significantly reducing COVID-19 infections at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, Texas, at the Medical Center from the Hebrew University Hadassah in Jerusalem, both from the University of California, San Diego, and from the University of California, Los Angeles, health systems, providing hope that the results will be similar elsewhere. In the UC systems, more than 36,600 health professionals received at least one dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines between December 16, 2020 and February 9, 2021. During that same period, more than 28,000 of these workers received their second dose. Not all of them were tested, but of the more than 14,000 that were, 379 people tested positive for COVID-19 at least one day after vaccination, and 71 percent of those who did, did so in the first two weeks after the first dose. In the end, only seven people tested positive 15 days or more after the second dose. Meanwhile, at the HHUMC in Jerusalem, there was also a steady decline in positive tests among workers who received the Pfizer vaccine the further away from their doses. 3. And in agreement with a third vaccination report among healthcare professionals in Israel https://t.co/cu1NIi5PEw pic.twitter.com/Rh7Ju1WAWY – Eric Topol (@EricTopol) March 23, 2021 Finally, at UTSW, where 70 percent of the more than 23,000 employees were vaccinated, there were clear differences in infections between those who were not inoculated, those who were partially inoculated and those who were fully inoculated in the first weeks of the system’s vaccination campaign. Only 4 out of 8,211 fully vaccinated employees tested positive, compared with 234 out of 8,969 workers who were not vaccinated. Very good news @NEJM today about the vaccine’s effectiveness in the United States and in the Israeli health workforce1. @UTSWNews health system with more than 23,000 employees, 70% vaccinated, had a dramatic reduction in infectionshttps: //t.co/xxMtfkDXpb pic.twitter.com/wR1vZfN46C – Eric Topol (@EricTopol) March 23, 2021 More stories from theweek.comThere There is no immigration crisis Sen. Tammy Duckworth says he will vote no on Biden nominees until the White House chooses Asian candidates A leap in Social Security benefits