Fully Vaccinated Woman Suffers Second COVID-19 Infection

Kim Akers is regarded as a coronavirus rarity. After receiving the COVID-19 vaccine, the Alaska woman got infected with the coronavirus, making her one of the breakthrough cases reported across the state.

This isn't the only thing that makes Akers' unique, however. Before getting inoculated, Akers, 50, had already contracted the coronavirus. But after receiving her vaccine last March, she tested positive again for COVID-19, the New York Post reported Monday.

“Just because you have had Covid or been fully vaccinated does not mean you can’t TEST POSITIVE,” Akers wrote on Facebook.

Akers, who is from Palmer, said she was surprised to find out that she again tested positive for the coronavirus even after receiving the Johnson & Johnson vaccine in early March.

As of last week, about 177 breakthrough cases were identified in Alaska. This number, however, only makes up about 1% of the people who have completed their vaccine cycle, according to the Anchorage Daily News. Of these cases, only about 12 patients tested positive for the virus twice.

Health officials point out that vaccine infections are not 100% effective in preventing infection, so it is still possible that a small percentage of fully vaccinated people contract the coronavirus.

Akers' case has only reinforced the precaution of wearing masks and practicing social distancing.

“It’s not time to go back to normal yet. We’re not at herd immunity. That’s why I did this," Akers shared.

Out of the 177 breakthrough cases in the state, only one required hospitalization, and no one has died, Alaska health department spokesman Clinton Bennett said. Moreover, health experts continue to reassure the public to not get discouraged when receiving the COVID-19 vaccine because of breakthrough cases. Multiple reports claim that the real-world efficacy rate of the mRNA vaccine is very close to the 95% efficacy found in earlier clinical trials, ADN reports.

“When you compare that to the flu vaccine, that’s more like 50, 60 percent, sometimes even lower on kind of a poor match year,” Dr. Coleman Cutchins, a state pharmacist, said during a media briefing Wednesday. “Ninety-five percent, it’s a pretty darn effective vaccine.”

Akers added that she decided to make her story public to show that the vaccines work.

“It would be great if it completely protected you,” she said, but that’s not what a vaccine is supposed to do. “It’s to keep you out of the hospital and prevent death and hopefully lessen your symptoms."