Quote:
Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield
The pertinent part of the article linked (color emphasis mine):
Covid-19 Live Updates: Researchers Document First Case of Virus Reinfection
A patient was diagnosed with a second case of Covid-19 more than four months after the first, scientists in Hong Kong said.
. . .
Work by researchers in Hong Kong founds that reinfection may be possible in rare cases.
Researchers in Hong Kong are reporting the first confirmed case of reinfection with the coronavirus.
“An apparently young and healthy patient had a second case of Covid-19 infection which was diagnosed 4.5 months after the first episode,” University of Hong Kong researchers said Monday in a statement.
The report is of concern because it suggests that immunity to the coronavirus may last only a few months in some people. And it has implications for vaccines being developed for the virus.
The 33-year-old man had only mild symptoms the first time, and no symptoms this time around. The reinfection was discovered when he returned from a trip to Spain, the researchers said, and the virus they sequenced closely matched the strain circulating in Europe in July and August.
“Our results prove that his second infection is caused by a new virus that he acquired recently rather than prolonged viral shedding,” said Dr. Kelvin Kai-Wang To, a clinical microbiologist at the University of Hong Kong.
Given that there are millions of cases worldwide, it is not unexpected that a few, or even a few dozen, people might be reinfected with the virus after only a few months, experts have said.
Doctors have reported several cases of presumed reinfection in the United States and elsewhere, but none of those cases have been confirmed with rigorous testing. Recovered people are known to shed viral fragments for weeks, which can cause tests to show a positive result in the absence of live virus.
But the Hong Kong researchers sequenced the virus from both rounds of infection and found significant differences in the two sets of virus, suggesting that the patient was infected a second time.
Common cold coronaviruses are known to cause reinfections in less than a year, but experts had hoped that the new coronavirus might behave more like its cousins SARS and MERS, which seemed to produce longer-lasting immunity of a few years. So the takeaways are:
1. This isn't surprising, but actually expected;
2. It is rare;
3. This person was all but assuredly infected first with a strain in Hong Kong, then later with a mutated strain in Europe, indicating the emergence of differences via mutation significant enough to effectively render the European strain a different virus than the Chinese strain, meaning this "reinfection" was more a pair of infections with two different viruses;
4. In both infections, no significant health impacts were noted.
Had this man been infected once in Hong Kong, then again in Hong Kong, with the exact same virus, this would be a much more concerning article.
This is an important article, but the Times' headline is leaning toward clickbait. "Man Infected with Two Strains of Covid from Different Parts of the World Within 5 Months" would be an accurate title. |
Unsurprisingly, you write a lot to cherry-pick just what you want.
4. Mild symptoms -- yeah a lot of people have mild symptoms. But a lot die. That's the fucking point.
3. Same virus, different sequence. It doesn't indicate there are two separate mutated strains, just that getting the virus doesn't prevent another bout.
2. This is "rare" because he's the first person sequenced. None of the other "reactivations" which are numerous have had the first and second "viruses" resequenced. Your unhighlighted parts admit that: "Doctors have reported several cases of presumed reinfection in the United States and elsewhere, but none of those cases have been confirmed with rigorous testing." See
https://tinyurl.com/y8dkmn5l
Many of the other "reactivations" had more serious bouts the second time around.
1. It is expected but that is why vaccines would have to be annually, or probably every three months. Or we could have locked it down for real to eliminate but Mah FreDumz.
