<div dir="ltr"><p style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px 0px 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:1.5;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)">"The <a href="https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-variants.html" class="gmail-hawk-link-parsed" style="font-family:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(2,108,162);text-decoration-line:none"><u style="font-family:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">delta variant</u></a> has dealt a blow to <a href="https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-vaccines-authorized-for-use.html" class="gmail-hawk-link-parsed" style="font-family:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(2,108,162);text-decoration-line:none"><u style="font-family:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">COVID-19 vaccine</u></a> effectiveness, which has dropped by about 25 percentage points since the variant became the dominant strain of coronavirus in the U.S., a new study among healthcare workers finds.</p><div id="gmail-ad-unit-1" class="gmail-ad-unit" style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"></div><p style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px 0px 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:1.5;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)">The study, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), found that the vaccines' effectiveness against COVID-19 infections declined from 91% prior to the delta variant's emergence, to 66% after the rise of the delta variant in the summer.</p><p style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px 0px 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:1.5;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)">Despite this "moderate reduction," health officials stressed that "the sustained two-thirds reduction in infection risk underscores the continued importance and benefits of COVID-19 vaccination," the authors wrote in the study, published Tuesday (Aug. 24) in the CDC journal <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7034e4.htm?s_cid=mm7034e4_w" class="gmail-hawk-link-parsed" style="font-family:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(2,108,162);text-decoration-line:none"><u style="font-family:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR)</u></a>.</p><p style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px 0px 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:1.5;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)">The study is based on information from more than 4,000 health care workers in six U.S. states (Arizona, Florida, Minnesota, Oregon, Texas and Utah), from mid-December 2020 through mid-August 2021. During the study period (both before and after the rise of the delta variant), the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines against infection was 80%, the study found.</p><div id="gmail-ad-unit-2" class="gmail-ad-unit" style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"></div><p style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px 0px 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:1.5;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)">Eight-three percent of healthcare workers in the study were vaccinated; 65% had received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, 33% had received the Moderna vaccine and 2% had received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine."</p><p style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px 0px 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:1.5;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"><a href="https://www.livescience.com/covid-19-vaccine-effectiveness-delta-cdc.html">https://www.livescience.com/covid-19-vaccine-effectiveness-delta-cdc.html</a><br></p><p style="font-family:"Open Sans",Arial,sans-serif;margin:0px 0px 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:1.5;font-size:16px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"><br></p></div>