A vaccinated person can test positive with Covid-19, research and data by the Rwanda Biomedical Centre (RBC) shows.

Officials from the agency say that they have recorded cases of persons who have received the full dosage test positive.

However, they said that the detected cases are still low and within the threshold of the vaccine’s efficacy. Rwanda has so far administered three vaccines; Moderna, Pfizer and AstraZeneca. 

"There are cases among the persons who have been vaccinated globally including Rwanda across all vaccine types, even in vaccines that have proven to be most effective with a 90 per cent protection, you are still going to have a 5 per cent of people who are going to get infected and potentially transmit disease,” Dr Aimee Geissler, the Global Health Security Director at CDC Rwanda explained.

CDC Rwanda is the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, which works with the Ministry of Health.

She added that this was especially the case among travelers who reported to have received two doses of the various vaccines but tested positive.

Geissler allayed fears noting that the number of cases reported does not exceed what would have been expected given the rate of efficacy of the vaccines in use in the country.

"This underlines the importance of people to continue observing the Covid-19 prevention measures. You are still at risk even if you have two doses of vaccines,” she added.

Commenting on the subject, Dr Sabin Nsanzimana, the Director-General of Rwanda Biomedical Centre said that the number of cases was considerably small, estimating at around 4 out of every 100 cases.

He also said that the scenario had been observed among those who had received the first dose and were awaiting the second one.

Nsanzimana added that a positive element was that the cases detected of vaccinated persons testing positive for Covid-19 were without symptoms meaning that there was little if any risk of severe sickness or hospitalization.

This shows that the vaccine serves the purpose to prevent severe infection.

However, like others who test positive for the virus, they can still pass on the virus.

With regard to blood clots among persons vaccinated with AstraZeneca, the RBC Director-General said that none has been reported locally adding that suspected cases had been investigated and found to have no association.

Over 390,000 people have been vaccinated in the country so far with the government planning to have up to 5 million doses in the country by the end of 2022.

The government on Saturday evening announced new measures to curb the spread of Covid-19 which include the daily curfew which was extended by one hour, running from 9p.m to 4a.m.

Public transport (buses) will be allowed to carry passengers only at 50 per cent of their capacity, while public offices will function at 30 per cent capacity - mainly allowing only essential staff in their premises.

This was in response to a surge in cases in the past week which RBC said that going by the random tests in Kigali, the positivity rate had risen to 2.2 per cent from 0.5 per cent about two weeks ago adding that like the rest of the region, Rwanda has seen a resurgence of cases in recent days.

RBC said that they had observed the emergence of clusters which include factories and communal places where people live in big numbers and have poor ventilation. Across the region, the number of cases has gone up with strains of the virus reported.