How long will the immunity last after COVID-19? What we know

by Lauren Rodda, PhD, Senior Postdoctoral Researcher in Immunology at the University of Washington School of Medicine, “Hard immunity is the immunity of a person who gets sick if enough people are protected from it by getting it from the infection, or by vaccination. Those who do not are very low.”

“Our community has people who cannot be vaccinated (babies, older people, people with weakened immunity) and rely on all of us to take precautions to protect them. This is important because it has to be done,” she said.

But Mr Rodda added that it’s a bad idea to simply allow the disease to spread unchecked in order to reach the herd’s immunity faster.

“COVID-19 can be deadly at any age,” she explains, “the cost to human life is terribly unacceptable.”

According to Rodda, vaccines are an ideal way to achieve herd immunity.

Dr. Steven SpaberRodda, the interim head of the infectious disease unit at the Hackensack University Medical Center, agreed with the vaccine that the vaccine was the best option, adding that widespread use of the vaccine is key.

“If the effective use of vaccines is inadequate, herd immunity may be hindered and infections may continue to spread,” he said.

Rodda said he’s not sure if people are immune to reinfection just because the research hasn’t been done yet.

“This would require tracking re-exposure to a significant number of people and determining if they got sick,” she said.

But she said studies were conducted by her and other teams, showing that antibodies to the virus persisted for at least three months.

In the preprint of her team Investigation In particular, though not yet peer-reviewed, this has been shown to occur even in people with mild symptoms.

Moreover, their research suggests that immunity can last much longer.

Rodda said he discovered that people who recovered from mild COVID-19 had memory B cells and memory T cells that were “functionally characterized.”

Memory cells give our immune system Memory It enables a faster, stronger response the next time it is encountered, compared to previous microbial invaders.

What this means is that if the people are re-exposed to the virus, these cells, along with the antibodies, are likely to protect them from the symptoms and further infection.

Immune memory for other diseases such as measles can last for years, says Rodda. This may also apply to COVID-19.

Sperber added that because SARS-CoV-2 is such a new coronavirus, there are still “a lot of things” that experts do not know about SARS-CoV-2.

He said it was among those remaining questions to be answered:

• Is it protected after infection? How long will the protection last?
• Are there patient-related factors (such as age) that affect immunity?
• Are there any factors related to viral infection that affect immunity (such as the severity of the disease)?
• What is the best way to measure immunity? Is it an antibody measurement? Do you have a specific type of antibody to measure?
• How long is the protection period after vaccination?

Sperber further advised that it is best to continue with precautionary measures, such as physical distances and wearing masks, even after recovery until better understanding.

According to Sperber, the results of the antibody test are not clear at this point if the virus isn’t infected.

The presence of antibodies only means that you have been exposed in the past.

In some infections, antibodies may provide protection against reinfection, Sperber explained.

For others, they may not prevent reinfection, but the symptoms may be less severe.

In yet other cases, the antibody may not provide any protection.

In addition, some test results may be “false positives.” Some may have been exposed to similar viruses found in the tests, but these antibodies are not protected against the new coronavirus.

Finally, he said, it is not known at this time how long the protection achieved will last.

Experts say that the best way to advance COVID-19 is to develop an effective vaccine against the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

Vaccines help control the virus by creating herd immunity.

Understanding how our immune system responds to viruses is an important step in vaccine development.

There are many things we do not know yet, but it seems that immunity to the virus develops for at least 3 months. There are also signs that immunity may last longer.

Although several promising vaccines are in development, tools such as physical distance and mask placement must be used to control the infection until they are available.