Utah Woman Shares Experience As ‘Breakthrough’ COVID-19 Case After Getting J&J Vaccine
Jul 22, 2021, 7:35 AM | Updated: 10:00 am
SALT LAKE CITY — Ruth Ann Haws said it feels like she has a cold, but she tested positive for COVID-19 after receiving the one-dose vaccine from Johnson and Johnson.
“I was 100% sure it was gonna come back negative. Then, it came back positive … I was shocked,” she said.
Her symptoms are not severe, but Haws said it was very surprising to receive the positive test result.
She is one of 132,000 Utahns who received the J&J vaccine, which a new study shows is only 33% effective against the new, highly contagious Delta variant. The study is facing some backlash because it was not peer-reviewed and had a small sample size.
Right now, the Centers for Disease Control is not recommending booster shots for anyone who received the J&J vaccine.
Dr. Brandon Webb, an infectious diseases physician with Intermountain Healthcare, said breakthrough cases involving J&J will be milder.
“If they do have a breakthrough case, the symptoms are expected to be much more mild and far less likely to result in hospitalization,” he said during a press conference Wednesday afternoon.
Haws said that is what she’s been experiencing.
“For me, the most annoying thing about COVID has been the inconvenience,” she told KSL TV.
For Utah patients who are hospitalized, doctors said 99.5% of them are not vaccinated and the numbers continue to rise.
Utah currently has 295 COVID-19 hospitalizations in the state.
“We’re moving into another phase where we’re going to be full again,” Webb said. “The reality is the pandemic is far from over. This is a terrible disease.”
