The Science You Need To Make Your COVID-19 Decisions – FiveThirtyEight

If there's one thing we've learned since March 2020, it's that pandemics are all about hard decisions. It's hard to keep track of the information that helps us make those choices let alone notice or remember when new science and expert recommendations come along. At FiveThirtyEight, we want to help. Weve read the science and have come up with broad assumptions you can make based on where the evidence is. When the science changes, so will the assumptions: Well be updating this page regularly as new research is published.

We think these assumptions will help you more easily make decisions for yourself and your family. (But do let us know if there are risk-assessment questions you think were leaving out.) We want this tool to be something that helps take the stress out of decision-making so that you can worry more about the best way to live and less about the virus.

Breakthrough cases especially symptomatic ones are rare, even with the reduced effectiveness of vaccines against the delta variant. If you do catch COVID-19 but you are vaccinated, you can spread it but are probably contagious for a shorter period of time and are probably less likely than an unvaccinated person to spread it.

It is possible for the delta variant of COVID-19 to spread outside, even among the vaccinated. That said, outdoor transmission is probably still unlikely if you avoid crowds. If youre vaccinated and not all up in one anothers business, outdoor transmission shouldnt be a major fear.

Long COVID is real, and it is possible for anyone to get it. That includes kids and vaccinated people although both are probably less likely to end up with long COVID than unvaccinated adults. But we dont really know the rates, largely because there still isnt any universal definition of what does and doesnt count as long COVID. Be cautious with assuming anything too precise from very imprecise research.

Yes. Everyone (kids included) is more likely to catch COVID-19 than they were earlier this year. The delta variant is more contagious, though it doesnt seem to be worse for kids than for adults, either in likelihood of transmission or severity of illness. Kids who spend their time around vaccinated adults and teens are at lower risk, but the benefits of vaccinating kids outweigh the risks.

As of early November, the CDC approved vaccination for children ages 5 and up. That was based on results of Pfizer's clinical trial and an analysis of the potential risks. An independent FDA analysis considered both Pfizer's finding that its vaccine is 91 percent effective at preventing COVID-19 in children ages 5-11 as well as the risks of both severe illness and a rare (but mild) vaccine side effect that has caused inflammation of heart tissue, particularly in young men. But Pfizers data included no instances of heart inflammation in the children ages 5 to 11 who received the vaccine, despite it occurring in an estimated 71.5 cases per million 16- and 17-year-old boys vaccinated. Ultimately, the FDA concluded that the benefits of vaccination outweighed the risks. Even if the number of kids hospitalized for heart inflammation exceeded the number of kids hospitalized for COVID-19, getting vaccinated would still be worth it because being hospitalized for heart inflammation is still that much less risky than being hospitalized for COVID.

They do. But effectiveness depends on the type of mask you and those around you are wearing.

Instant at-home tests and PCR tests can both be useful. But it matters when you're using them and what you're trying to do.

Compared with at-home antigen tests, PCR tests are less likely to deliver a false negative over a longer period of time, but when it comes to the critical three days when a COVID-infected person is most contagious, the at-home antigen tests and the PCR tests are both very accurate, according to Michael Mina, a professor of epidemiology at Harvard University. Before and after the peak of infectiousness, the PCR tests are likelier to spot a COVID-19 infection. But at-home tests can be used effectively as a tool for public health, too. One example Mina uses is if everyone had to take a test at the beginning of a school day. If there were five people actually infected, the PCR tests would be more likely to identify them all but you'd need to wait for the results and, in the meantime, all those people would be wandering around the school for a day or two. The instant antigen tests, meanwhile, might only identify four of the infected people, but you'd know immediately and could send them home. And the other one might be identified by a rapid test the next morning, if you were testing every day. Overall, fewer people are exposed and less disease is spread.

Its still best to follow the CDC guidelines, which currently recommend a quarantine for 14 days (from the point of exposure) for unvaccinated people. They also recommend testing at least five days after exposure. Vaccinated people, according to the CDC, can skip quarantine if they show no symptoms, but they should still be tested three to five days after contact and wear a mask indoors in public until they have the results. (The CDC also says there are ways to shorten the quarantine period.)

Most infected people will show symptoms or a positive test result within 14 days of exposure, said Michael Springer, a professor of systems biology at Harvard University. But theres a reason some quarantine periods arent 14 days long. Recommended quarantine timelines are based both on scientific evidence about how long it takes for COVID-19 to make a person sick or contagious, and on attempts to balance that with other kinds of concerns, including economic constraints, child care availability and plain ol' not wanting to be trapped in the house that long. The deviations from CDC guidelines dont mean experts cant agree on the science, Springer told us. Instead, the deviations demonstrate that different communities are trying to balance the competing needs of science and society in a variety of ways. A long quarantine that ends up ignored could lead to more transmission than a shorter quarantine that allows some cases to slip through but has a higher compliance rate. Changing science and circumstances are also factors. Most recently, CDC guidelines changed to give vaccinated people an easier, quarantine-free path because research shows they're less likely to catch and transmit COVID-19. And you should expect recommended quarantine lengths to change in the future, Springer said. If a new variant turns up and has high rates of vaccine breakthrough or takes longer to develop symptoms, that'll change the calculus. On the flip side, if vaccination rates get high enough, quarantine recommendations could disappear altogether.

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The Science You Need To Make Your COVID-19 Decisions - FiveThirtyEight