I’m still unsure how much I and other fully vaccinated people should worry about Delta, but I’m leaning towards taking it seriously based on the a

If you’re vaccinated, your main risk from the Delta variant is probably long-haul COVID

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2021-08-04 23:00:05

I’m still unsure how much I and other fully vaccinated people should worry about Delta, but I’m leaning towards taking it seriously based on the available early evidence.

First, Delta is *much* more infectious than the original COVID, with various groups estimating an R0 of 5-9 vs the original COVID’s 2-3.   This means the coming spike in Delta cases will be very hard to contain, even with the sorts of countermeasures we saw last year.  That said, using a mask in public areas and avoiding high risk scenarios will still reduce the viral load you’re exposed to, and if society takes these actions collectively we’ll slow the spread of Delta, which will prevent the medical system from being overwhelmed in less vaccinated areas.  Increased infectiousness alone isn’t enough to make the disease of serious concern; there are plenty of mild illnesses like chicken pox with high infectiousness rates.  What makes Delta a concern is the combination of high infectiousness with high risk of serious or ongoing illness.

Getting vaccinated is still a big benefit, both individually and societally.  On average it drastically reduces the acute consequences of catching Delta, significantly reducing the severity of illness but often not preventing it entirely.  On the whole, Delta infections tend to be milder for fully vaccinated people, with recent data from Israel showing vaccinated people are 93% less likely to be hospitalized from Delta.  If the pre-vaccination risk of hospitalization from COVID for someone in your age/risk group is 4%, then your post-vaccination risk of hospitalization if you catch Delta would be 4%*7%*(1/0.36) = 0.78%.  (The additional 1/0.36 term is to prevent the 64% reduction in COVID cases that the vaccine provides from being counted, since we're answering the question of the risk of hospitalization presuming you get COVID.)   Unless you’re older or in a high risk group, these are very good odds.  Here’s one tool for estimating your pre-vaccination risk of hospitalization if you catch COVID based on age, sex, and underlying conditions; you can multiply it by 0.19 to get your post-vaccination risk.

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