Vaccination against COVID-19 greatly reduces the risk of developing serious complications from COVID-19, especially in people with underlying medical conditions. Accordingly, a smaller number of COVID-19 patients would develop a secondary bacterial infection, which may need to be treated with an antibiotic.

By preventing severe disease, vaccination against COVID-19 reduces the need for antibiotics in at-risk patients and also reduces the inappropriate use of antibiotics for serious viral infections that do not require or benefit from antibiotics.