One family’s experience a case study in virus transmission
Ever wonder if COVID-19 vaccines work? Ask the Wiebe family. The Saskatoon residents had a textbook experience with the virus.
“Our experience lines up exactly with the current data on mRNA vaccine efficacy at preventing both infection and more severe illness,” wrote Nathan Wiebe in a Facebook post.
Nathan and his wife, Renee, decided their eligible family members should get vaccinated for COVID-19 after one of his co-workers – a previously healthy person – died from the virus.
“We are a large family who live in a small space and we do a lot of wrestling, cuddling, scratching, fighting, five-kids-to-a-couch when we watch a movie, etcetera, so when one of us gets sick, we all get it,” said Nathan.
About six weeks after the eligible family members began to get immunized, the virus swept through the Wiebe household.
Five of their seven children are under the age of 12 and not eligible to be vaccinated. Nathan said although their age range was at the lowest risk to get COVID-19, they were all hit hard.
“High fevers, out of commission for a number of days, throwing up. All tested positive for the Delta variant.”
Their two older children had a different experience. Their 13-year-old was fully vaccinated; their 12-year-old had received one of two doses. Neither had any symptoms, but as a precaution went for COVID-19 testing anyway. Both tested negative.
Renee, who is fully vaccinated, also had no COVID-19 symptoms and tested negative for the virus. Nathan, on the other hand, who is also fully vaccinated, developed a low fever, a runny nose and minor body aches for a couple of days. After testing negative three times, his fourth test showed a positive result.
“Our family is a small sample size, but our experience jives with the published vaccine test data which shows that mRNA vaccines have a 75 to 85 per cent chance of preventing infection completely for the Delta variant. In our case, three out of four of our vaccinated family members did not get infected.
“Manufacturers also claim a 95 per cent chance of significantly reduced severity of illness. This is also true for us. My illness was less severe than all five of the infected kids, despite my being in a category 100 times more at risk of severe illness,” said Nathan, who describes himself as sedentary and overweight.
Nathan said he and Renee are sharing their story because, as people of faith, they would like others in their community to understand why they believe vaccination is the right choice.
“We are disappointed to hear when other people in faith communities are skeptical of medical science or science in general, or are inclined to believe that gratefully accepting a vaccine to fight an illness is somehow in conflict with entrusting their health to God,” said Nathan.
"We believe that both the science behind modern medicine and the hard-working people in the medical community are a gift from God, and that vaccines are the way out of this pandemic."
