4 ms·
No honest scientist would say what you wrote as your “nutshell.” Specifically, T cell response is not equivalent at all to “you can’t catch it.” Still all scen
by acqq 6y ago
No honest scientist would say what you wrote as your “nutshell.” Specifically, T cell response is not equivalent at all to “you can’t catch it.” Still all scenarios are possible: 1) you can still catch it, and still get more sick 2) you can catch it, and be less sick 3) you can be “sterilizingly immune” meaning that you won’t get sick and won’t be able to transmit to somebody else.
But which of those will be by majority the study just didn’t investigate.
In immunology no answer is “yes” or “no” but the range. The range is different between different people, and we can conclude what the typical ranges are, if there’s enough data collected. But the ranges are still unknown at the moment.
The same reason (a need to find the ranges) is why you can’t make a vaccine candidate and be sure how it will work, unless you run big and long enough trials. And that’s why that takes time.
Here’s what this study figured out, quoting from the article: “The size of T cell response differed between individuals, being considerably (50%) higher in people who had experienced symptomatic disease at the time of infection six months previously. Further research will be needed to determine the significance of this finding.”
As you see, again some range, but also not concluding what you claim.
- Robotbeat 6y agoWe have been running a "natural" trial on millions of people. From that, we can already tell that reinfection, although possible, is very rare.
- acqq 6y ago> From that, we can already tell that reinfection, although possible, is very rare. No. From the current papers, we just know that the reinfection where people have had their virus sequenced in both first and second infection is very rare. The problem is technological. Up to now there are around 50 million confirmed cases in the world but probably less than 100 thousand sequencings performed, and only a few sequencings by those who had strong enough symptoms twice and had the chance to have sequencing twice. Without sequencing one just can’t prove that some case is an actual reinfection. All other cases are just “possible” (i.e. unprovable) reinfections and nobody can claim anything worthy of a scientific paper about them.
- macintux 6y agoCan we really? Infection itself is still somewhat uncommon, thanks to the global reaction to the pandemic. I don't doubt that reinfection will be rare, at least over the span of a few months, but to my mind that would seem unproven given how hard we're (generally) working to keep people from being infected in the first place.
- krona 6y agoIn many countries, healthcare workers are exposed (to varying degrees) on a daily basis.
- Symmetry 6y agoGood point. I'd hope they'd receive regular testing as well.
- kaitai 6y agoUnfortunately, your hope is unfounded. My spouse is a physician and when coughing (acute bronchitis) could not get a test without job consequences (being forced to take 10 days off and reschedule all patients regardless of the outcome of the test). There has been an exposure in a neighboring ward through a fellow healthcare worker and tests are not being made available broadly. Remember, in the US healthcare workers generally have to go through insurance to get approved for tests, etc., even though they work in healthcare -- they're not at this time provided anything more than the general public in terms of diagnostics. (At least spouse gets free masks at work, haha...)
- rusk 6y agoYes ... and they are getting reinfected. The fatality rate among medics is quite high relative to general population
- krona 6y agoThe fatality rate among medics is quite high relative to general population 'Quite high' could mean anything, but if you're implying 'higher than' then that isn't supported by the statistics I've seen in a dozen countries.
- Symmetry 6y agoI'm not sure we can rule out the idea that reinfection after 6 months is common but almost always asymptomatic in people with healthy immune systems. There was that British common cold coronavirus challenge trial where most subjects could be reinfected after 1 year, confirmed by PCR, but none of them developed symptoms.
- acqq 6y agoWhich could mean that such asymptomatic people could still infect somebody vulnerable, if they shed enough virus at some point of their reinfection. The open question is, again, what will be the percentage of such cases.
- SomeoneFromCA 6y agoUnfortunately there are several taboos on many forums, regarding discussion Covid. For ex.: Covid reinfections, lab origins of covid etc.
- acqq 6y agoSARS-CoV-2 has not been created in the lab. The genome looks completely different than such.
- anoncake 6y agoHow do you identify a lab-created virus?
- SomeoneFromCA 6y agoOf course there is no way. I think people need to start relaxing. Trump has lost, so stop being afraid talking about the lab origins of Covid.
- SomeoneFromCA 6y agoYeah, exactly what I was talking about. There is no way to say this just by looking at the genome, all you can do is to say that is not very probable, and that would still be a dubious claim. There is a plenty of gnome manipulations that leave no trace. Having said that, lab origin does not neccesarily mean genetic manipulation. Serial passage through animals (say, minks) will leave no trace of genetic engineering, but may make the virus contagius to humans (minks and humans have similar ACE2 receptor). Or just poorly handled sample from the would do.
- kaitai 6y agoThere is a temporal component here. As an ancestor commenter said, "you can't catch it again right away" (emphasis added). We do not know (because we cannot know) if reinfection is possible after two years, for instance, because we have not had the virus for two years yet.
- rusk 6y agoDon’t forget there are lifestyle factors that can effect your immune response. You’ll typically fight off a cold except for that one time when it catches you tired, or stressed ...
- SomeoneFromCA 6y agoDo you know how academic, narrow and unpractically stiff are criteria for a proof of reinfection? You need to have the viral genome sequenced TWO times, and both times it must be a slightly DIFFERENT virus. In that context "very rare" is not a useful term.