What happens if you have the vaccine but currently have COVID?

[Gobacktothe90s]

Maybe a silly question but curious if you currently have COVID but didn't know you had it and had the vaccine how would it affect you?
Would you then develop severe symptoms you might not have had after having the vaccine and a double exposure to the virus?

The Pfizer vaccine isn't a live virus, so there's no double-exposure.

Surely you wouldn't be going out having the vaccine if you are covid positive you'd be at home isolating or am I missing something here?

@3littlewords

Surely you wouldn't be going out having the vaccine if you are covid positive you'd be at home isolating or am I missing something here?

Missed the memo about asymptomatic cases, clearly

or am I missing something here?
Yes, you're missing but didn't know you had it.

So you've been vaccinated, and then tested positive after the vaccine?

You wouldn’t get more severe symptoms because they don’t actually inject you with any of the live virus (so you would never get an illness from a vaccine).
I haven’t read up on the effectiveness if you already have Covid but because of how vaccines work I don’t think the effectiveness would be changed.

I would like to think the vaccine would help, but probably not straight away.

I have wondered if people already in hospital with covid are receiving the vaccine and whether it would help them.

@Mindymomo

I would like to think the vaccine would help, but probably not straight away.

I have wondered if people already in hospital with covid are receiving the vaccine and whether it would help them.

People in hospital with Covid won’t be given the vaccine - you cannot have the vaccine within 28 days of a positive test

I had read that having first dose makes the vaccine about 53% effective after a week. I am guessing if you do get the virus around the time of vaccination either the vaccination would have had no impact if you have the virus or its less severe symptoms of covid

In general having a vaccine while youre already unwell doesn't make you more ill, but does reduce the efficacy of the vaccination. This is because if your immune system is already active you have have phagocytes circulating that 'eat' the vaccine as part of the immune response rather than producing antibodies to it like we want the immune system to. This is why you're always asked if you're feeling well when you go for your flu jab. However the Pfizer jab is a new type of vaccine so unsure of this would be the case with that one, but will be the case with Oxford

@muddledmidget. Thanks for the explanation, it makes sense.

Hi as per this link below the covid vaccine needs weeks to start working in your body. So if you have the vaccine while you have covid the vaccines might not work.
www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/coronavirus-vaccination/coronavirus-vaccine/

Someone I know had the vaccine (NHS). She was feeling ropey before and tested negative. Had vaccine. Continued to feel ropey and then learnt she had been in contact with someone who had tested positive the day before the vaccine. Tested again and it was positive. Her only symptoms were hot flushes and headache. She's fine now and will presumably carry on and get her second part of vaccine next month x

93 year old great uncle had the first dose of the vaccine last week and he suffered over the past week with shaking, fatigue and finally a cardiac arrest. Prior to this he had arthritis but nothing more serious.

A member of the family had been in contact with him 9 days before testing positive for Covid so we are not sure if he actually had the virus before the vaccine. I did wonder if the two had made him very ill, a very sad time for the whole family to lose a lively man though.

@abitofpeace

93 year old great uncle had the first dose of the vaccine last week and he suffered over the past week with shaking, fatigue and finally a cardiac arrest. Prior to this he had arthritis but nothing more serious.

A member of the family had been in contact with him 9 days before testing positive for Covid so we are not sure if he actually had the virus before the vaccine. I did wonder if the two had made him very ill, a very sad time for the whole family to lose a lively man though.

This is incredibly sad. I'm so sorry for your loss x