TRENTON, NJ – On Monday, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy announced 18,390 COVID-19 “breakthrough” cases of the virus in residents who had previously been fully vaccinated.
That rate is just .35% of the total fully vaccinated population of vaccinated individuals. Of those fully vaccinated individuals who caught COVID-19, 386 were hospitalized and 97 died.
“Now we do also have updated figures as they pertain to the breakthrough cases of individuals who were fully vaccinated by August 30th and in every instance, the vaccines continue to prove incredibly powerful in preventing not only new infections but most importantly COVID-related hospitalizations and deaths. Here are the preliminary figures for the week from August 23rd to August 29th specifically,” Murphy said. “As I mentioned a few weeks ago, as figures are constantly updated as Dr. Ed and his team do their work, the cumulative totals are the most illustrative of the vaccine’s strengths, but regardless, these figures who conclusively that the overwhelming number of individuals contracting the virus, going to the hospital because of a COVID-related illness, or sadly dying from complications of COVID continue to be folks who are overwhelmingly either unvaccinated or under-vaccinated. There is simply no other way to interpret this data. The vaccines work, and they work well. Here are the case numbers for today including the positivity rate from last Thursday and the seven-day average rate of transmission, and in both cases those are down from last Monday, although we still have a ways to go. Here is what was going on in our hospitals yesterday, and sadly, here are the latest confirmed losses of life. Unfathomable. “
To date, 5,703,634 New Jerseyans are fully vaccinated.