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What's The Risk Of Going To The Gym After The Vaccine?

In our series "What's the Risk?" experts weigh in on what risks different scenarios pose for transmitting COVID-19.
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As more people become vaccinated, you might be wondering about the risks of getting sick with COVID-19. 

We asked the experts, what’s the risk of going to the gym after the vaccine?

Their take: The risk of contracting COVID-19 is medium.

"Moderate, if not high-risk categories, even after a vaccine. We've definitely seen reports recently of outbreaks related to going to an indoor gym because people are not just breathing at their normal level. When you exercise, you breathe in a deeper, more rapid fashion, and you can expel that virus more effectively in the gym setting," Dr. Kelly Cawcutt, associate medical director of infection control and epidemiology at Nebraska Medical Center, said.

"The best thing to do is, if you can, you exercise outdoors. And if you are in a gym, then you still wear a mask and you still try to socially distance," Dr. Frank Esper, pediatric infectious diseases specialist at the Cleveland Clinic, said. 

"If you're on an exercise cardio machine, you have some distance from the person next to you and wearing a mask in between. I think definitely that goes a long way in preventing risk," Dr. Irfan N. Hafiz, infectious disease physician and northwest region chief medical officer at Northwestern Medicine, said. 

For more answers on what is low-, medium- or high-risk, visit newsy.com/whatstherisk.