Coronavirus reinfection may occur every year across the globe, suggested by a study, saying that COVID-19 immunity can disappear after three months. The new research claimed that annual coronavirus infection could happen, just like common cold or flu, creating the idea that the viral disease could be eliminated with the help of herd immunity, explained by Daily Mail.
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More than ninety COVID-19 patients and healthcare workers at Guys's and St. Thomas' NHS foundation trust, examined by scientists at King's College London, were involved in the study. The researchers found antibody levels appearing three weeks after symptoms, and then vanishing later.
"People are producing a reasonable antibody response to the virus, but it's waning over a short period of time and depending on how high your peak is, that determines how long the antibodies are staying," said the study's lead author, Dr. Katie Doores via Daily Mail.
It was explained that the patients who had the most severe symptoms were the ones who developed the highest antibody levels, which lasted the longest. However, the findings also revealed that an effective vaccine for the virus may need to be redeveloped every year since the protection it provides may not be very long-lasting. Although this is the case, the study explained that the novel coronavirus can fight off again using T-cells, even if the antibody levels drop.
Antibodies are not the only one that can fight off COVID-19
Human immunity doesn't solely depend on antibodies, so the declining antibody levels shouldn't cause additional concern, as explained by Business Insider. White blood cells could also help our bodies to fight off the invading virus because of its impressive immunological memory. New antibodies could also be produced by B cells, while infected cells can be eliminated by T cells.
"If you're reinfected after some time, it would be an attenuated disease. It will be not as severe as the first time because your B and T cells remember the virus and react quickly," said a vaccinologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Florian Krammer.
The immune response of the patients to the viral virus could be connected in a different layer of the immune system since the research discovered that COVID-19 patients did not develop detectable antibodies. It was also stated that the level of antibodies needed by an individual to be considered "immune" is still unclear.
"We do not know how much protection the antibodies may provide or how long this protection may last," wrote the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Krammer said that compared to measles and other viruses that have better studies, which provide information about the needed antibodies, coronavirus doesn't have enough studies.
