Do people who are vaccinated carry 251 times the load of COVID-19 viruses in their nostrils compared to those who are unvaccinated?

An anti-vaccine website falsely claimed a study by Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Vietnam made such a finding. But the study’s authors say the website distorted their findings.

The study found vaccinated health care workers with breakthrough infections due to the highly infectious coronavirus delta variant carried 251-times more virus in their nostrils compared to patients infected with earlier strains of the virus in spring 2020.

“The differences in viral load were driven by the ability of the Delta variant to cause higher viral loads; they had nothing to do with the vaccination status of the infected individual,” the lead authors wrote in response to false claims about their study. “Thus the claim that vaccinated individuals carry 251 times the loads of SARS-CoV-2 in their respiratory tract compared to the unvaccinated people is a misrepresentation of the data.”