Having contracted the coronavirus and being healed does not mean being out of the tunnel. The virus can come back. A study conducted by researchers from the University Hospital Foundation Agostino Gemelli IRCCS and the Catholic University, Rome campus tells us that one out of 5 patients recovered from COVID-19, even in the absence of any symptoms, is positivized again after a few weeks even if less than 1% has a true reinfection .
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Research
The research, published in Jama Internal Medicine, was carried out by monitoring 176 patients recovered from Covid-19 followed, from April to June, in the Gemelli post-Covid center. Healing was assessed on the basis of standard criteria: absence of fever for 3 consecutive days, improvement of symptoms and 2 negative molecular swabs 24 hours apart. During the follow-up, approximately 50 days after diagnosis, the nasopharyngeal samples of these patients were analyzed for the presence of both total viral RNA and replicative viral RNA (RNA is the molecule in which the genetic information of the virus resides). The good news is, however, that returning positive does not mean having the virus.
«The presence of replicative Rna in the samples – explained Professor Maurizio Sanguinetti, Professor of Microbiology at the Catholic University and Director of the Department of Laboratory and Infectious Diseases of Gemelli – was used as an indicator of viral replication in progress. In patients who tested positive for total RNA, the samples obtained at the time of the Covid-19 diagnosis were again analyzed, looking for the presence of replicative RNA. All patients also underwent serological testing for virus-specific IgG / IgA. Among the 176 recovered patients, 32 tested positive for total RNA, albeit to varying degrees. Only one of these, however, also tested positive for Sars CoV-2 replicative RNA. Samples obtained from patients at the time of illness were retested and, as expected, all were positive for replicative RNA. Let it be clear that returning positive is not a worrying fact ».
In fact, only one of the patients actually tested positive for both total and replicative RNA. It is an elderly subject with hypertension, diabetes and cardiovascular disease who returned positive 16 days after recovery.
And give
“In the case of this patient, the data suggest that it is a reinfection or recurrence of infection – comments Professor Sanguinetti -, while for the remaining 31 patients who tested positive only for total RNA, it is more likely that it is an elimination of fragments of viral Rna, following resolution of the infection “.
This study, according to experts, confirms the usefulness of performing an accurate follow up of healed patients and reinforces the concept that reinfections in healed patients are rare. What is not known at the moment is whether the new positives are contagious. In fact, the molecular test is not the equivalent of a viral culture and, therefore, does not allow to ascertain whether in the sample taken from the nasopharynx of the patients there is a vital virus and, consequently, transmissible.
Mistakes
But if research is making great strides, the virus also runs fast. “In the management of the pandemic, mistakes were certainly made and we are now in an expansionary phase. I am referring to the free all of this summer. We are still paying the bill due to the opening of the discos – explained Sanguinetti – In order not to see the almost 38,000 infections of yesterday and the 636 deaths, it is necessary for everyone to acquire a real awareness of the problem. Especially the young. Maybe a 20-year-old will not die of covid but, if he had a motorbike accident, he would risk not receiving adequate and timely treatment in the hospital. The problem is this. We all risk, young and old. In the face of a pandemic, we need to think in terms of the community and respect a few simple rules of common sense ».
Last updated: 23:07
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