Mum has covid 4 weeks after vaccine

[Jj2431]

I'm clueless. My mum works for the NHS and had the jab a month ago but now has positive covid test. She's tired and lost sense of smell but so far doing ok. Does this mean the vaccine doesn't work or does it mean She's just unlikely to get very unwell with it? I'm so confused and worried and also feel hopeless about the vaccine now.

@Naillig222 that’s not relevant. One dose of either AZ or Pfizer is 100% effective against severe disease, hospitalisation or death after 2-3 weeks. Stay calm OP.

Did she get both doses of the vaccine?

I don’t think that makes any difference. The important question is will she get very ill. I hope not!

I'm sorry your mum is unwell @Jj2431. But it has been pretty widely reported and explained that having the vaccine doesn't stop everyone from catching Covid, just that they are highly likely to get a much milder version if they do. I really don't mean to be mean to you personally, OP, but I am genuinely surprised when I see threads on here suggesting people don't actually know that.

So she's had one vacation? It's not up to maximum protection until you have 2 so there's taht. There's also the fact it's just 4 weeks since the vaccination. So as it builds up over time to full or beat immunity sher immunity will likely be quite low.

I'd hope that what it will do is lessen the severity of her illness.

No it's not.

I would ignore the majority of posts on this thread as there's a lot of misunderstanding or misinformation.
Puzzledobserver's post is a great summary.

I hope your mum recovers quickly, it's great that she has had the vaccine 4 weeks ago as it means her symptoms are extremely likely to stay quite mild.

@pinkhappy

Did she get both doses of the vaccine?

I don’t think that makes any difference. The important question is will she get very ill. I hope not!

It doesn't make a difference in this particular case, no, because she is already positive. But surely it's ok to ask/discuss whether she has had both doses or just one? I also hope she doesn't get very unwell.

[quote Blessex]@Naillig222 that’s not relevant. One dose of either AZ or Pfizer is 100% effective against severe disease, hospitalisation or death after 2-3 weeks. Stay calm OP.[/quote]
That is simply not true.
It will more than likely reduce chances of being severely ill but it's not 100% effective at any stage. Even with two doses.

Ok but with 2 doses you're going to get less ill (if you get ill) than one dose

In both cases you're not going to get hospitalised but you could still get more ill if you have one dose than if you have both

I've cross posted with you Nailleg

Another vote of thanks to @PuzzledObserver for clearly explaining exactly the things I had been wondering about.

Friend of mine is a HCP, had 1 vaccine and then caught it. Her husband also caught it, he hadn't had a vaccine. She felt ropey but he ended up in hospital. He is out now and they are both recovering. She sufferer a lot less than he did, one assumes because of the vaccine.

@Naillig222 sorry but what I said is true based on the trial data.

After one dose (after 2-3 weeks of building immunity) of either Pfizer or AZ there were ZERO people who were hospitalised or died. ZERO.

@Naillig222 and when you say not 100% effective what do you mean? 100% effective against severe disease or death? 100% effective against catching it at all? 100% effective of having no symptoms?

@Jj2431 sending lots of healing vibes to your mum, and calming ones to you. It is natural to be anxious - I was, both for me and DH. Please know that the statistics are overwhelmingly in favour of her making a full recovery, even without the vaccine. A month on - well, no-one in the trial group for either vaccine became seriously ill.

My sister (61, nurse) tested positive 2 weeks after her first shot. Sore throat and stuffy nose for a couple of days, then sat at home feeling bored for the rest of her isolation period.

@Blessex I suppose it is understandable that if people hear vaccine A is more effective than vaccine B, they will naturally prefer to have vaccine A.

What they don’t grasp is that once in the early stages of a vaccine campaign, any effective vaccine is better for you than no vaccine at all. Your best strategy is to take any vaccine offered at the earliest opportunity.

Later on, once the crucial threshold has been reached, your protection comes primarily from the herd effect of so many people being immune. Which vaccine you personally received makes very little difference. You can always top up with another one at a later date anyway.

@PuzzledObserver yes I agree with you. Of course it would be better for them to have AZ than wait to have Pfizer. But this is where I blame the media and politicians for spreading scare theories and misinformation. So happy fingers crossed that the majority here are just getting on with it ams getting jabbed.

@PuzzledObserver thank you so much for your posts. I could feel my blood pressure going up in response to some of the misinformation, and reading your calm and accurate summary brought it down again.

[quote Blessex]@Naillig222 sorry but what I said is true based on the trial data.

After one dose (after 2-3 weeks of building immunity) of either Pfizer or AZ there were ZERO people who were hospitalised or died. ZERO.[/quote]
The only caveat to that is that, while the trial groups were quite large, once the vaccines are rolled out to billions of people, there may well be some severe cases or deaths among vaccinated people.

It will be a tiny fraction of the rate among unvaccinated people, but probably not quite zero.

That’s why we want widespread vaccination ASAP. That will reduce the risk of encountering the virus massively, and if you don’t encounter it, you can’t catch it.

@Motorina uffff me too.

@PuzzledObserver well yes but the likelihood as you say is negligible. And certainly not enough to worry the OP. The trial data showed zero people got seriously ill or hospitalised after one dose (after waiting 2-3 weeks for immunity to build up). So whilst of course once extrapolated to population level there may be the odd case - it will be tiny.

Apart from the fact that the vaccine isn't 100% effective with one dose, it takes 3 weeks after receiving it before it properly works. Covid has an incubation period of up to 10-14 days, so she could feasibly have caught it within that initial 3 week post-jab period.

Now what I have been getting my head around is - when Pfizer gave a % efficacy are we comparing like with like vs the AZ % efficacy

I'm having difficulty with this too.
I'm in a group (HCW) that is being offered AZ. My colleagues do not want to take the AZ, they prefer to wait for the Pfizer vaccine.

@Chutneywashisname I would snap up whatever you are offered. I won’t be offered mine until May - June and will take what I am given. Wish I had the luxury of a choice at this stage.

Blessex I think that is easier to say when you are further away from seeing the needle. When the injection is imminent, the full realisation that the AZ's data fares worse in comparison with the other vaccines is frightening. Many colleagues are refusing the AZ which makes others even more hesitant to proceed.

If a nurse tests positive, does everyone on her shift that came into contact with her need to self isolate for 10 days?