By Mackenzie Hastie
Researchers have recorded the first ever recorded case of a Coronavirus Reinfection.
A Hong-Kong man who was cleared of COVID-19 in April has tested positive when returning from Spain via the UK.
The man did not show any symptoms of reinfection and is shown to be experiencing a second infection from a different strain of Coronavirus.
A Report from the International Medical Journal stated that
“Our findings suggest that SARS-CoV-2 may persist in the global human population as is the case for other common-cold associated human coronaviruses…”
Paper Researchers (Yet to be published) https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08-25/hong-kong-researchers-first-documented-coronavirus-reinfection/12591746
These findings do not mean that taking vaccines are not useless: one of the leading authors of the paper stated that Immunity that is born from vaccination can be different from natural immunity.
Researchers state that the results of the vaccine trials effectiveness will influence the decisions.
Jeffrey Barrett, expert & consultant on the COVID-19 Project at Britain’s Wellcome Sanger Institute stated that it was very hard to make any strong inference from a single observation.
“Given the number of global infections to date, seeing one case of reinfection is not that surprising, even if it is a very rare occurrence”
Jeffrey Barett, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08-25/hong-kong-researchers-first-documented-coronavirus-reinfection/12591746
This is not the first time that there have been purported cases of reinfections.
Mainland China has ha multiple cases of people who had shown recovery from the disease tested positive once again, though it is unclear if these cases were instances of the virus still remaining in someone’s system or a genuine case of reinfection.