SALT LAKE CITY – Utah is nearing 1 million residents who have received at least one COVID-19 vaccine.
Of that number, more than 540,000 Utahns have been fully vaccinated, according to data from the Utah Department of Health on Friday. But as that number grows, Utah is not alone in documented “breakthrough” COVID-19 cases. These are new cases of COVID-19 even after they have been fully vaccinated.
Dr. Angela Dunn, Utah Department of Health state epidemiologist, confirmed Thursday that there are 97 confirmed breakthrough cases among the 521,000 fully vaccinated Utahns at the time, representing less than 0.02% of the number of fully vaccinated Utahns up to the numbers from Thursday.
“This is truly amazing and speaks to the great effectiveness of the vaccines we have,” she said of the low breakthrough rate.
Many other states in the US also reported low breakthrough cases. The Washington State Department of Health on Tuesday acknowledged that it had 102 documented breakthrough cases; the Star Tribune reported last week that there were 89 cases in Minnesota.
There are a few reasons for breakthrough cases. First, medical experts are quick to say that no vaccine is 100% effective; Health department officials have not specified which vaccine was given in any of the breakthrough cases, but it is possible with any vaccine.
Second, public health officials have warned that variants of the coronavirus could potentially make the vaccines less effective.
So far, only two of the breakthrough cases have been sequenced, and both were variants originating in California known as B.427 / 429. That is one of the variants that the state health service has not yet provided information about in the data, and a variant that less has been researched than the more well-known varieties originating in Brazil, South Africa or the United Kingdom.
“There is some concern about the emerging variants that the effectiveness of the vaccines will decrease, but they are still very effective vaccines, which is fantastic,” she said. “We are not concerned that the (variants) will reduce effectiveness to such an extent that we would have to change our public health strategy … the science shows us that the vaccines are still effective against the variants.”
State health officials were still optimistic that the vaccine was doing its job, even after breakthrough cases occurred.
Dunn said there was a recent cluster of more than 15 breakthrough cases in a long-term care facility in Utah, but none of those who tested positive had any symptoms. It was an indication that the vaccine prevented serious illness, even if fully vaccinated people contracted COVID-19.
“This is a population that, prior to vaccination, would have a very high mortality rate,” she said. “This time, because of the vaccine, none of them even had any symptoms.”
There are still five hospital admissions among the 97 documented cases in Utah. Dunn said all five were “older adults with underlying health problems,” making it unclear whether their hospital admissions were related to COVID-19 or because of their other health problems.
The state plans to continue tracking and sequencing breakthrough cases in the future, helping public health experts better understand how variants affect the vaccination process. Dunn also encouraged Utahns to get the vaccine as soon as possible, which can help reduce the risk of variants spreading.
Said Dunn: “This will keep us in the right direction and end this pandemic.”