Researchers found from blood tests that the patient’s body could not make antibodies (pictorial)
New York:
While most people infected with the new coronavirus actively shed the pathogen for about eight days, scientists have reported an unusual case of a patient with blood cancer who carried the virus for about 105 days, “And remained infectious for at least 70 days” without experiencing any symptoms the entire time.
Understanding how long people can remain actively infected is important because it provides new details about COVID-19 that are still not fully understood, according to the study, published in the journal Cell.
“At the time we started this study, we really didn’t know much about how long the virus was shedding,” said study lead author Vincent Munster, virologist at the National Allergy Institute. and infectious diseases in the United States.
“As this virus continues to spread, more and more people with various immunosuppressive disorders will become infected, and it is important to understand how SARS-CoV-2 behaves in these populations,” said Mr. Munster.
The Kirkland, Wash., Patient had been infected very early in the COVID-19 pandemic and had numerous PCR tests positive for the virus over a period of several weeks, the study noted.
According to the researchers, the patient, a 71-year-old female, was immunosuppressed from chronic blood cancer but never showed symptoms of COVID-19.
She was found infected with the virus when tested after being admitted to hospital with severe anemia, and her doctors acknowledged she had been a resident of a rehabilitation center experiencing a major outbreak.
As the researchers studied samples that were regularly collected from the patient’s upper respiratory tract, they found that the infectious virus continued to be present for at least 70 days after the first positive test and the woman had completely failed. eliminated the virus only after day. 105.
“We expected this to happen, but it had never been reported before,” Munster said.
Researchers believe the patient remained infectious for so long because her weakened immune system never allowed her to respond.
Never mind that, never mind.
According to scientists, even treatment with antibodies from recovered COVID-19 patients had little effect on his health.
It does not matter if you are looking for something.
When the scientists examined the patient to see how the virus may have evolved during the infection, they found that samples taken from her at different times had different dominant genetic variants of the virus.
However, the researchers believe that these mutations did not play a role in the duration of the virus’ persistence because they saw no evidence of the pathogen’s evolution.
According to Munster, this could be the longest case of anyone actively infected with the coronavirus while remaining asymptomatic.
“We have seen similar cases with the flu and Middle East respiratory syndrome, which is also caused by coronavirus. We expect to see more reports like ours come out in the future,” he said. declared.
(Except for the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is posted from a syndicated feed.)
