FILE PHOTO: Students attend to take the Diploma of Secondary Education (DSE) exams, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Hong Kong, China, 24 April 2020. Jerome Favre/ Pool via REUTERS
August 25 (ANI): A Hong Kong man, who had first tested positive for COVID-19 in March and made a full recovery was re-infected months later after making a trip overseas, according to researchers.
A pre-print study, by a team at the University of Hong Kong, purports to be the "world's first documentation" of a patient who recovered from coronavirus contracting the infection again. Researchers sequenced the genome of his first and second infections to show that virus strains were different, suggesting that he was re-infected, The Washington Post reported. Although there have been unconfirmed reports of people contracting COVID-19 again after recovering from the virus, the study, which has not been peer-reviewed, has potential implications for vaccine use and policies pertaining to the concept of herd immunity which presumes those who recover from the disease will not be re-infected.
The Hong Kong man, a 33-year-old IT worker with a reported history of good health, had first tested positive for COVID-19 in late March. He had symptoms of fever and cough and was rushed to the hospital. The patient recovered and was discharged in mid-April after testing negative for the infection. However, in August, after visiting Spain via the UK, he again tested positive when he returned to Hong Kong, despite being asymptomatic.
In the research paper, study author Kwok-Yung Yuen and his colleagues suggested that herd immunity is unlikely to eliminate coronavirus and a potential vaccine might not provide lifelong immunity to the infection.
