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In most people, SARS-CoV-2 specific antibodies gradually decreased over the course of three to four months.
Representative image. Mufid Majnun / Unsplash
The first case of COVID-19 was reported in December of last year. Since then, the disease has infected more than 47 million people, of which more than 34 million have recovered successfully. However, even after all these cases, scientists cannot say for sure how long recovered patients will remain immune to the disease.
This is partly because the disease is very new and there is still much to learn about it. There have also been cases of reinfections, most likely from a different strain of the virus, but it is still a possibility.
Evidence from previous coronaviruses has shown that antibodies to this class of viruses last no more than six months and begin to decline rapidly after the disease resolves. People with severe COVID-19 have been shown to have a larger repertoire of antibodies than those with mild illness.
However, a group of researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the US stated that they have found a subset of coronavirus patients who develop a strong and long-lasting antibody response even after contracting mild to moderate illness.
The study findings are published in the journal Cell.
The study
For the study, Dr. Duane Wesemann, an immunologist with the Brigham Division of Allergy and Clinical Immunology and associate professor at Harvard Medical School, and his team enrolled 92 people from the Boston area who had contracted mild COVID-19. to moderate between March and June 2020. All but five patients were monitored at home.
Blood samples were collected from all patients every month and antibodies were measured in each sample, especially the IgG antibody, which is seen later in infection but remains in the body for a long time.
Based on the difference in antibody levels, the researchers divided the teams into two parts: those that kept virus-specific antibodies for a long time (the supporters) and those that did not.
In most people, SARS-CoV-2 specific antibodies gradually decreased over the course of three to four months. However, in 20 percent of people, antibody production was maintained and increased over the same time period.
Those who sustained antibodies showed symptoms for a much shorter duration: 10 days compared to the normal 16 days. They also had a difference in memory B and T cells. Memory cells are those cells of the immune system that make sure your body recognizes and generates a rapid antibody response in the event that a pathogen attacks your body a second time.
In a press release from Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Wesemann said: “Finding out how these people can support longer-term antibody production is relevant to COVID-19, and will also have important implications for our understanding of the immune system in general. “
Study limitations
In the press release, the study authors mentioned that the study had a major limitation in that the majority of the volunteers were white women.
Therefore, more diverse studies are needed to confirm the findings of this study and determine if something similar is happening in asymptomatic and severe COVID-19 patients.
For more information, read our article on immunity to COVID-19.
The Health Articles on Firstpost are written by myUpchar.com, India’s first and largest resource for verified medical information. At myUpchar, researchers and journalists work with doctors to provide you with information on all things health.
