Breakthrough COVID-19 hospitalizations 'extremely uncommon': study

LOS ANGELES - Hospitalizations due to breakthrough COVID-19 infections are extremely uncommon, with fewer than 1 in 1,000 hospitalized with a case after getting vaccinated, a new study from Mayo Clinic suggested.

The study, published in Clinical Infectious Diseases, found that the hospitalization rate for vaccinated patients was 0.06 percent, or 6 in 10,000 patients, and 1 in 10,000 among those who have received their shot and acquired prior immunity through previous infection.

The study supports previous studies that show vaccination is the best way to prevent severe COVID-19 infection, hospitalization and death, said Mayo Clinic in a release on Tuesday.

"In the general primary care patient population, those who have been vaccinated have very low risk of subsequent hospitalization for breakthrough COVID-19," said lead author Benjamin Pollock, a researcher in the Center for the Science of Health Care Delivery at Mayo Clinic. "Our study shows that while it can and does happen, that these occurrences are extremely uncommon."

The researchers created a longitudinal study of 106,349 primary care patients at Mayo Clinic in Rochester who were 18 or older and tested positive for COVID-19, and/or were vaccinated for COVID-19, according to the release.

Of those patients, only 69 were hospitalized because of a breakthrough COVID-19 infection, the study suggested.