At least 11 employees at Sunrise Hospital & Medical Center are believed to have contracted the Covid-19 coronavirus … [+]
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Vaccinations can offer very good protection against Covid-19. But that doesn’t mean you should gamble too much.
Las Vegas, Nevada, the city where you can buy a shirt and lose it all in one night, was the site of yet another Covid-19 outbreak involving fully vaccinated people. At least 11 employees at the Las Vegas-based Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center were involved in this outbreak. According to Mary Hynes reporting for the Las Vegas Review journal, eight of the affected employees had been fully vaccinated in December and January, two had received the first two-dose dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, and one was not vaccinated. At least 10 of them were infected with the more contagious Delta variant of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2).
All of them had attended an event on June 7th, which Sunrise CEO Todd P. Sklamberg described as an “external, private party”. It wasn’t clear what exactly was happening at the party. The Las Vegas Review Journal did not offer play-by-play or video footage. Of course, as you know, parties in general can range from very quiet “dress up as your favorite piece of furniture” to parties with jello shots, handcuffs, and various farm animals. So without details on this “outside, private party” it’s hard to tell if this was a cautious, cautious party that maintained social distancing and mask use, compared to a standard party with no Covid-19 precautions or something more wild. Regardless of what happened, the party is believed to be the source of the outbreak among hospital workers.
A first question was whether the hospital staff got a bad batch of the Covid-19 vaccines. However, so far there is no evidence that the vaccines have been mishandled. Although the staff had some symptoms, it appears that they have all returned to work. And what happened among the 11 Las Vegas hospital workers may have stayed among the Las Vegas hospital workers. There are no reports of them subsequently infecting other patients or hospital staff.
This outbreak is another reminder that, while the Covid-19 vaccines are good, they are not perfect. Don’t treat them like huge, full-body, concrete condoms. They do not offer 100% protection. You can still get infected if you’re not careful. Being fully vaccinated doesn’t mean you should start sharing spaghetti with others, like Lady shared this noodle with Tramp in Disney’s Lady and the Tramp. It doesn’t even mean you should be around people who may not be fully vaccinated or around unvaccinated people who are not wearing face masks. That would be like playing roulette with a respiratory virus.
Last year Las Vegas had to adjust to a new normal as seen here unless you think of “Nude Hand” … [+]
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Vaccination is like underwear that can have a few holes. In this case, holes don’t just mean the holes through which you put your torso and legs. Underwear without holes would be really weird and nothing more than a cotton balloon. Instead, holes mean extra openings that could let some things through, things you don’t want to reach. For this reason, you don’t go to interviews, business meetings, or dates all in underwear, especially if your underwear is very holey.
As long as the pandemic emergency continues and the Covid-19 coronavirus is actively circulating in your community, vaccination alone may not be enough to keep you safe. It is better to follow other precautions such as social distancing and the use of face masks as well. Here, too, the Covid 19 vaccine can offer very good protection. However, the level of protection you get depends on the percentage of the people around you who are vaccinated. The higher the vaccination coverage around you, the better protected you are. As long as vaccination rates are below thresholds for adequate herd immunity (ie, at least 70% of people with long-term immunity), the virus can continue to circulate. And the pandemic emergency will remain an emergency.
Few people are seen in this Fremont Street crowd, social distancing or wearing face masks … [+]
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But too many people are already behaving as if the pandemic is over and the emergency is over. Face masks have become as rare in many places as tuxedos in the sauna. Instead of holding two meters or a denzel apart (because Denzel Washington is about six feet tall), they seem to be more than a squirrel apart, even when it is not clear who has been vaccinated and who has not. As horror films should have taught you by now, you shouldn’t relax completely until the danger really has passed. (You should never have sex in the woods in the dark, either, but that’s another story.)
The proliferation of the Delta variant and the newly discovered carelessness could lead to a spike in Covid-19 cases in the U.S. Nevada is just one of the states that has seen a boom, as Ross DiMattei described for KTNV. For example, the surge in Covid-19 cases has brought Southern Hills Hospital in Nevada closer and closer to critical capacity. At the same time, the average age of those infected appears to be falling, from 53 years earlier in the pandemic to 41 years. Most of the Covid-19 cases were among those who weren’t vaccinated, so don’t take any of this as a sign that the Covid-19 vaccines are not working.
Although no longer required, face masks can help reduce the transmission of the Covid-19 coronavirus. … [+]
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However, the cases also contained a small number of breakthrough cases. A landmark case is when SARS-CoV-2 can breach vaccine protection, like an alpaca passing security in a casino. This new segment of KTNV Channel 13 Las Vegas reports that about 80% of Covid-19 cases were among the unvaccinated:
How many breakthrough cases will it take to make people realize that being fully vaccinated doesn’t mean invincible? It doesn’t mean you do what you did before the pandemic. It doesn’t mean giving up all other Covid-19 precautions like they were fur boots or velor tracksuits with the word “Juicy” on your bum. Just two days ago I covered breakthrough Forbes infections that happened at an outdoor wedding. In late June, I wrote for Forbes about the number of people hospitalized or dying from breakthrough infections.
Again, this is not to say that you shouldn’t get vaccinated. The vaccine still offers very good protection. In addition, should you catch the virus, your Covid-19 symptoms can be much milder if you are vaccinated than if you are not vaccinated.
However, all of this says that if you do become infected, don’t roll the dice. There are still many people who are not vaccinated but act like they are. People can lie in Las Vegas and elsewhere. The idea that once you are vaccinated you can give up all other Covid-19 precautions is rife with craps, so a game of craps.
