A study by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, published by the magazine Nature, reveals that people who have passed the Covid-19 in a mild way have keep immune cells in your body months after they have recovered that pump antibodies against the virus. A protection that, in addition, could persist throughout life.
“We found antibody-producing cells in people 11 months after the first symptoms. These cells will live and produce antibodies for the rest of people’s lives. That is strong evidence for long-lasting immunity,” explains Ali Ellebedy, associate professor of pathology and immunology, medicine and molecular microbiology.
Long-lasting immunity against Covid-19 is maintained in the bone marrow
This work shows that after the resolution of the infection, a small population of antibody-producing cells, called long-lived plasma cells, migrate to the bone marrow and they settle down. And from there, they will be continually producing low levels of antibodies in the bloodstream to help protect against another encounter with the virus.
To reach this conclusion, Ellebedy and his colleagues obtained bone marrow of 19 people who had passed the Covid-19 mildly seven to eight months after your initial infections. Five of them returned four months later and provided a second bone marrow sample. For comparison, the scientists also obtained bone marrow from 11 people who had never had Covid-19.
15 of the 19 bone marrow samples from people who had had Covid-19 contained antibody-producing cells that were specifically targeting the virus that causes Covod-19. Cells that could still be found four months later in the five people who returned to provide a second bone marrow sample. None of the 11 people who had never had Covid-19 had antibody-producing cells in their bone marrow
This presence of these cells in the bone marrow also caused the levels of antibodies in the blood of Covid-19 participants to be maintained over time, with some detectable antibodies even 11 months after infection.
Asymptomatic individuals may also have long-lasting immunity to Covid-19
Researchers in this study have also speculated that people who were infected and never had symptoms may also be left with long-lasting immunity. “It could be either way. Inflammation plays a big role in severe Covid-19, and too much inflammation can lead to faulty immune responses. But on the other hand, the reason people get seriously ill is often because they have a large amount of virus in the body and having a large amount of virus can lead to a good immune response. Therefore, it is not clear, “said first author Jackson Turner, instructor in pathology and immunology.
“We need to replicate the study in people with moderate to severe infections to understand whether they are likely to be protected from reinfection,” he added. Researchers are currently studying whether vaccination also induces long-lasting antibody-producing cells.
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