I got my second shot of Moderna on April 14.

On October 14 (so six months later to the day), I got the strange feeling I was coming down with a cold. I rarely get colds, and sometimes whatever I think might be a cold goes away by morning. This time, there wasn't the usual progression of symptoms but things didn't clear up by the next day, either. Or the next. Or the next. It was just an intermittent headache, followed by feeling fine. Or my right ear might feel scratchy for 5 minutes, then nothing. Or a sore throat in the morning that went away with a glass of water.

On Oct. 19, I decided to get tested because this was all just so odd, and my daughter was coming up for a visit. I squeezed into an urgent care appointment, and the doctor examined me. No fever. Pulse ox 100. BP normal. Heart and lungs sound perfect. She said I should probably just take a Claritin and consult my primary, but she would run a rapid test and a PCR test just in case.

She came back 10 minutes later saying the rapid test was positive. This means I have had the virus a while, as that test detects your response to the virus and is rarely a false positive. She told me to quarantine for 10 days from the onset of symptoms and until I no longer had fever or symptoms (neither of which I really had).

She also gave me a referral for the monoclonal antibodies infusion, or whatever they gave Trump. Trouble was, you have to decide whether you want the treatment within the first 10 days or they won't give it to you later. For me, decision day was Sunday.

I went home and did some research. The treatment is not without risks. One known risk is that you will in the future be more susceptible to Covid, and the other known risk is that future doses of the vaccine will be less effective. And there is the risk of an allergic reaction. And of course there are the risks they don't know about since this is all so new. So I skipped the treatment.

Today is Day 12, and I still feel fine. Headache is gone, and I feel like my athletic performance (measured by Peloton history) has suffered, but then again it's not like I'm pushing myself.

The good news, I guess, is that vaccines work. And based on what I read, the most bullet-proof you can be is two doses of Moderna plus a breakthrough infection.

I guess I will skip the booster.

Cindy -- who can't smell but who can still taste, which comes in handy for picking up dog poop

Oh, I forgot to mention all of the other people I exposed before I got tested.

There's Mr. Sphinx. He was around me every day and didn't get Covid.

And there are my many tennis partners, given that I played tennis indoors and masked almost every day. None of them contracted it either.

And there are the workers who were doing my bathroom (masked, while I worked on the back patio). They are OK.

I guess that means it is true that you are less infectious if you're vaccinated.

Glad you are doing well and did not spread it.

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There's Mr. Sphinx. He was around me every day and didn't get Covid.

Well, unless he was completely asymptomatic!

Glad it was a minor event. My eldest has a slightly worse breakthrough, but still nothing really threatening.

Glad you're doing OK.

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Cindy -- who can't smell but who can still taste, which comes in handy for picking up dog poop

I might have phrased that "--who can taste but not smell, which comes in handy..."


Seriously I'm glad you are doing fine.

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Originally posted by jon-nyc:

quote:

Cindy -- who can't smell but who can still taste, which comes in handy for picking up dog poop

I might have phrased that "--who can taste but not smell, which comes in handy..."


Seriously I'm glad you are doing fine.

Maybe she meant it exactly as she wrote it.

Cindy, glad you’re mostly ok!

Re this:

quote:

One known risk is that you will in the future be more susceptible to Covid, and the other known risk is that future doses of the vaccine will be less effective

I had not heard any of that. Of course, I haven’t been paying attention to that part of it.

But still, Wow.

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Originally posted by Cindysphinx:

Cindy -- who can't smell but who can still taste, which comes in handy for picking up dog poop

When did you discover you couldn’t smell? Glad you’re not tasteless! (seriously, though, was it during those fleeting almost symptoms, or after testing?

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Originally posted by ShiroKuro:
Cindy, glad you’re mostly ok!

Re this:

quote:

One known risk is that you will in the future be more susceptible to Covid, and the other known risk is that future doses of the vaccine will be less effective

I had not heard any of that. Of course, I haven’t been paying attention to that part of it.

But still, Wow.

Yeah I'd actually like to know the source for that, because I just googled a bit and read a bunch of studies and couldn't find any info on that. And it makes no sense from what I know of the science....Monoclonal antibodies do their job and disappear from your body, so I don't understand how they'd have any effect on future doses of the vaccine unless you are planning to get the vaccine within the time frame that they say not to.....and whether you get antibodody treatment or not, if you are covid positive, there is a window of time afterwards that they say not to get the vaccine.

Would love to see sources, because I know several family memebers/friends who recently got the antibody treatment and none of them were informed of any risks like that.

I have not read anything like that either, but I haven't done a deep dive on monoclonal antibodies.

Our dance instructor is 21, healthy and in terrific athletic shape. She got a breakthrough infection after vaccination, and it put her in bed for a whole week, with barely enough energy to get out of bed for necessities.

quote:

Originally posted by Cindysphinx:
Oh, I forgot to mention all of the other people I exposed before I got tested.

There's Mr. Sphinx. He was around me every day and didn't get Covid.

And there are my many tennis partners, given that I played tennis indoors and masked almost every day. None of them contracted it either.

And there are the workers who were doing my bathroom (masked, while I worked on the back patio). They are OK.

I guess that means it is true that you are less infectious if you're vaccinated.

Actually, I don't think that's the case.

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A new study from the University of California, Davis, Genome Center, UC San Francisco and the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub shows no significant difference in viral load between vaccinated and unvaccinated people who tested positive for the delta variant of SARS-CoV-2. It also found no significant difference between infected people with or without symptoms.

https://www.ucdavis.edu/health...-unvaccinated-people

The people around you either were able to fight off the viral load they encountered or they were asymptomatic...

Does viral load necessarily translate into transmissibility?

My understanding was that part of the reason that the delta variant is more contagious is that the viral load is so much higher.

As far as vaccinated vs unvaccinated...

quote:

New data was released by the CDC showing that vaccinated people infected with the delta variant can carry detectable viral loads similar to those of people who are unvaccinated, though in the vaccinated, these levels rapidly diminish. There is also some question about how cultivatable—or viable—this virus retrieved from vaccinated people actually is.

While this sounds discouraging, it’s important to keep three things in mind:

Vaccines remain highly effective at preventing severe disease.
Breakthrough infections among vaccinated individuals remain uncommon.
The majority of new COVID-19 infections in the US are among unvaccinated people.

https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2...ccinated-individuals

So the vaccine might play somewhat of a role.

There's so much we still don't know.