Misguided fear of vaccine shedding keeps family apart

Dear Dr. Roach: My granddaughter refuses to let us see or pick up her 4 ½-month-old baby because we may be shedding the virus by having been vaccinated against COVID-19. Could you please shed some light on this? We do not understand what this means. In the meantime, we are missing out on the progress of the baby, and we miss him terribly. — L.M.

Dear L.M.: "Shedding" after vaccination refers to people being contagious despite having no symptoms. Shedding is a possibility only after vaccination with a live vaccine. Even then, it is very, very rare for a person to develop complications after exposure to a recently vaccinated person.

For example, the MMR vaccine is a live vaccine, but there has never been a published case of a person getting ill after exposure to the current version of the vaccine. However, live polio vaccine had the potential to shed, and also the potential to cause illness. It has been replaced by a killed vaccine.

The live chickenpox vaccine has the possibility of live virus shedding, but it’s very low risk to contacts. Rotavirus vaccine can lead to spread to household contacts if their immune system is very weakened, and there have been a few reports of diarrhea.

Vaccines made from killed virus, vaccines made from purified proteins of bacteria or virus, vaccines which use a viral vector (such as the Astra-Zeneca and Janssen/ Johnson & Johnson vaccines) and those using mRNA (such as the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines) cannot shed live virus. There is no risk to your granddaughter or her child.

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