People who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 can still test positive for the virus. Health officials have come to refer to that as a “breakthrough case” of the disease.
But some health experts say the term can be misleading and misconstrued, especially as new variants have emerged and vaccination rates across the country have slowed.
“I think it was setting the vaccine up for an impossible standard that vaccines can’t possibly meet,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and the lead epidemiologist for the Johns Hopkins COVID-19 Testing Insights Initiative.
