Home » Health » According to these researchers, immunity to Sars-CoV-2 could only be “transitory, last a little while and then disappear”

According to these researchers, immunity to Sars-CoV-2 could only be “transitory, last a little while and then disappear”

Sars-CoV-2, the coronavirus behind COVID-19, has already infected more than 12,420,000 people worldwide, with more than 558,000 deaths. Because this scourge is still recent, we really know very little about it, but researchers keep learning a little more every day.

As you know, a vaccine will not be ready anytime soon. To make matters worse, the results of a recent study suggest that immunity against COVID-19 would only be temporary, when the scientific community had thought that a patient who had recovered from COVID-19 would develop antibodies against it.

Photo credit Mohamed Hassan – Pixabay.com

Indeed, after tests carried out on blood samples from people recovered from COVID-19, a team of Spanish scientists was able to demonstrate that while only 5% of patients developed antibodies, they disappeared in 14% of them, after a few weeks.

Being positive for COVID-19 antibodies does not mean being immune

According to Raquel Yotti, the director of the Spanish Institute of Health Carlos III who also participated in this study, even if the antibodies can allow to be immunized, this immunity is only temporary. According to their results, these antibodies simply disappear after a few weeks.

Ian Jones, professor of virology at the University of Reading, also said that even if antibodies are detected, protection is not guaranteed. Thus, in the patients who were tested, those who presented mild symptoms did not benefit from long-lasting immunity.

Read also : What if the Covid-19 has been dormant for years?

The famous theory of collective immunity is undermined

While the antibodies disappeared after a few weeks in severe cases, they were only present for a few days in those who had mild symptoms, according to this study. Jones further emphasized that no infection causing mild symptoms can cause immunological memory.

In fact, the antibodies intended to combat COVID-19, which were moreover only found in 5% of the patients tested, disappear sooner or later, these people could therefore be infected again.

For this reason, the theory of collective immunity so dear to certain researchers would not ultimately be possible, according to these results.

Read also : Monkeys infected with Covid-19 have successfully developed immunity




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