An Analysis of SARS-CoV-2 Vaccine Breakthrough Infections and Associated Clinical Outcomes

  1. Heather Kerwin
  2. Rex Briggs
  3. Sameer Nair-Desai
  4. Andrew Gorzalski
  5. Mark Pandori
  6. Stefanie Friedhoff
  7. Thomas C. Tsai

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Abstract

Understanding the rate and clinical features associated with vaccine breakthrough infections (VBT) is of critical public health importance. Recent evidence on VBT in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, has prompted guidance on masking for vaccinated individuals in areas of high community-level transmission. 1 Additional data is needed to better understand the prevalence and rate of VBT infections. Using detailed disease investigation data from Washoe County, Nevada we sought to assess the rate of symptomatic infection and serious illness among VBT cases compared to non-vaccinated individuals with COVID-19. From February 12 - July 29, 2021, the Washoe County Health District identified and traced 6,128 out of 6,399 reported cases across the sample period. 338 (5.5%) of all cases were identified as breakthrough infections, and 289 (86%) vaccinated individuals had symptomatic infections. Severe clinical outcomes were infrequent with 17 hospitalizations (5% of VBT) and no deaths. Cycle threshold values were not statistically different between vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals.

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  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.09.09.21262448: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Ethicsnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.

    About SciScore

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  2. Version published to 10.1101/2021.09.09.21262448v1 on medRxiv