I received my first covid shit today and I am friends with the person that have it to me. When she went to uncap the needle I saw the needle brush up against her glove. I’m fairly certain it didn’t poke her and she would have noticed I think. 

I’m not really concerned about hiv but I’m afraid that I may get an infection from the needle touching something that wasn’t sterile? Like Hepatitis B? Or bacteria that might have been on the glove? 

In hindsight I should have said something, but I was so nervous about getting the shot that I just brushed it off. Now I’m regretting that. 

I’m sorry that it’s directly related to stds, but this is the only place I could find to get info.  If you’re not able to answer please just use my payment as a donation. :)

If the needle did brush against the glove of the person preparing to inject your vaccine that was a breach in protocol.  Healthcare providers are trained to not allow needles for either injection or withdrawal of blood to touch anything before they are used for their planned purpose. That said, the risk of infection from the event you described is quite low. We are trained to change gloves between every patient and the the gloves while not formally sterilized are clean and devoid of bacteria. The risk of bacterial infection from inadvertent contact with the surface of a glove, while theoretically possible, is realistically very, very low.  Further, unless the glove had been contaminated with someone else’s blood there would certainly be not even be a theoretical risk of infection with blood-borne pathogen’s such as the hepatitis virus.

Overall, if there was a contact of the needle with the glove, the risk for infection is very very low and it would not concern me at all unless you develop warmth, unusual tenderness, or spreading redness within a day or two of the injection.  Similarly, other than observation, I see no need for testing related to this incident. 

I hope these perspectives are helpful. EWH