The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Rochelle Walensky, said Wednesday that people who are fully vaccinated do not have to wear masks for protection against the current COVID-19 variants. At the same time, the World Health Organization (WHO) and Los Angeles County health officials are now recommending that even fully vaccinated people wear masks indoors to ward off the highly contagious Delta variant.
According to The Hill, Walensky says that our vaccines are highly effective against the variant, so there is no need for facial coverings.
“If you are vaccinated you are safe from the variants that are circulating here in the United States,” she said, reinforcing the CDC’s stance. Walensky said that the WHO recommendation is appropriate globally where vaccination rates are lower than in the U.S.
Experts say that currently, the Delta variant comprises about 25% of new infections in the U.S., but in some regions of the country the percentage is significantly higher, according to Healthline. It is likely to become the dominant virus in America as it has in other countries.
Because the variant is so highly transmissible, some health officials, like those in Los Angeles County, would rather be safe than sorry. Walensky said that she did not criticize the county for its decision.
“We have always said that local policy makers need to make policies for their local government,” she stated, according to The Hill.
The Delta variant was first detected in India and is now found in 80 countries. According to Public Health England, it is responsible for over 90 % of new COVID-19 cases in the U.K., says Healthline. News from Israel suggests that 90% of new COVID-19 cases were triggered by the Delta variant and 50% of these cases occurred in fully vaccinated people.
“It’s extraordinarily contagious,” said infectious disease expert Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University. “Given that it is so very contagious, remember, the virus’ only job is to infect someone else so it can keep reproducing. Here in Nashville, essentially 90% of people hospitalized today are unvaccinated or incompletely vaccinated.”
A study published in May by Public Health England found that two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine provided 88% efficacy against symptomatic disease from the Delta variant, according to Healthline.
Dr. Schaffner said that a big concern with the Delta mutation is that preliminary research indicates that is not only more transmissible than previous versions of the virus, but that it also causes more long-term complications. However, he said that vaccines are still the answer.
“The current vaccines are effective at providing protection against the Delta variant,” confirmed Dr. David Alan Hirschwerk, an infectious disease expert at Northwell Health in Manhasset, N.Y. “There will continue to be some breakthrough infections in people who are vaccinated, regardless of the strain. However, it remains the case that in vaccinated individuals who have breakthrough infections, the symptoms are very mild, or the patients are asymptomatic and only detected by screening.”