A study conducted by Public Health England has shown that a single dose of the Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine can reduce the risk of coronavirus transmission by nearly half among individuals living in the same household, where the risk of infection is high. The public health agency stated that people who contracted the virus three weeks after receiving a vaccine dose were 38% to 49% less likely to transmit the virus to family members compared to those who were unvaccinated. This level of protection observed on the fourteenth day after vaccination is similar regardless of the vaccinated individual’s age or the number of household members. British Health Minister Matt Hancock said, "This is great news. We already knew that vaccines save lives, and this comprehensive study conducted in real-world settings also shows that they reduce transmission of this deadly virus."
The study included 57,000 individuals from 24,000 households where someone who received the vaccine had tested positive, and they were compared to about one million unvaccinated people. The agency considered households as "high-risk" places for transmission and added, "Similar results could be recorded in places with comparable transmission risks, such as shared housing and prisons." The organization notes that a single vaccine dose could also reduce the appearance of symptoms by 60% to 65% after four weeks. Previous studies from the agency indicated that the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines prevented the risk of death in 10,400 cases among individuals over 60 years of age by the end of March. The UK, the country most affected by the virus in Europe with over 127,000 deaths, launched a widespread vaccination campaign in early December and is currently using the AstraZeneca, Pfizer/BioNTech, and Moderna vaccines. Nearly 34 million first doses have been administered, and a quarter of the adult population, or 13.2 million people, have received a second dose, according to official figures released on Tuesday.
