DAVIS, Calif. — As we move further into 2021, many questions regarding COVID-19 and the vaccine are still on everyone's minds.
Dr. Dean Blumberg, professor of pediatrics and chief of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at UC Davis Health, was part of a virtual conversation hosted by the university discussing COVID-19 variants and vaccines.
Here are some of the questions Dr. Blumberg answered during the virtual discussion:
Q: Will my vaccine protect me against the new variants?
A: “When we get these vaccines, we have an immune response to not just one area of the spike protein, but we have an immune response to several areas of the spike protein," explained Dr. Blumberg. "Whereas, a mutation is going to be just one part of the spike protein. So maybe we won’t be able to neutralize that part so well, but we’re going to have antibodies and immune responses to several other parts of the spike protein. So I would expect at least partial protection.”
Q: Should I worry about transmission if I’m vaccinated but my family is not?
A: “We just don’t have enough information on protection from transmission in vaccinated people," explained Dr. Blumberg. "And so we do think that people who are vaccinated should continue to follow the social distancing and masking advice.”
Q: Should I worry if I get one of the “less effective” vaccines?
A: “So one of the things to realize is when you see these numbers, that these vaccine efficacy studies, they were performed under different conditions. So they’re done in different populations. They’re done at different time periods where there’s different rates of transmission and different pressure for infection. And they have different definitions for efficacy. So they’re not directly comparable," explained Dr. Blumberg. "I know it feels good to have a vaccine that’s like 95% effective, versus one that they say is 77% effective, but you can’t directly compare those numbers. And so for all we know, when you do a head to head, they might be equivalent. So I would take any available vaccine.”
Q: Should I be worried about in-person learning?
A: “We already know that children are not driving this pandemic. We hope to get schools open soon," explained Dr. Blumberg. "We think we can get schools open with very little risk to other students and to teachers and staff. That this can be done. So this can be good for children and families.”
Q: What makes you optimistic right now?
A: “I think things are going to get better. We’ve got two vaccines that are available now. We’ve got three other vaccines that we expect to be available over the next couple of months," explained Dr. Blumberg. "And that’s why I think we’ve been talking about April as a time we might have enough vaccine capacity for everybody to be able to be immunized who wants a vaccine.”
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