Just a quick post to say that I heard this morning about a friend of mine who has recovered from Covid19 about three months ago. She has cancer, and was due for an operation. She has been again tested positive for the virus, after attending the hospital for a pre-op. YOU CAN GET IT TWICE!
Be careful out there everyone.
Yes. My son and his wife thought they had it in early March and have now tested positive for it.
They are responsible people .My daughter in law thinks hers possibly came through her work in a public place even though she protects herself.
I have heard of many many apparent false positives so unless a person has been ill I am a little sceptical.
Me too Bob. Also that the test picks up traces of " dead" virus cells over the next few months .
I agree with you too Bob.
bbc.co.uk/news/health-54696873
Research indicates COVID 19 antibodies decline rapidly so you can get it more than once.
Sorry to hear your friend is struggling and wish them a speedy resolution where possible,
So annoying for your friend. Did the covid make her poorly the first or this second time?
Sadly, both.
That's not good to hear. Has she any idea how she caught it?
Thank you for posting momist. Poor lady - I hope she has some more resistance to it this time.
It seems the tests pick up dead leftover virus "pieces" and come up with positive results, when in fact it has gone. There's a story of 3 guys being stuck in Florence for 61 days continually testing positive when they weren't.
You can get any virus twice. Hopefully after the first time you develop antibodies so you fight it off more easily the second time. That's the theory behind herd immunity. Hope your friend is OK.
Life must be very difficult these days for your friend, goodness me. I have read that the test can give a "false positive" in the sense that in some people it can react to antibodies or viral remnants from a past infection. If your friend isn't experiencing symptoms this second time around, then might that be the case?
Steve
The tests for Covid have a false positive rate of between 0.8% and 4% (from The Lancet). A total of 30m tests have been carried out so far in the UK, so between 240,000 and 1.2m will be false positives.
900,000 people have tested positive so far. So the proportion of those who do not really have the virus is potentially very high.
So I think almost certainly one of your friend's tests was a false positive, so you can relax, it is very unlikely your fried caught Covid twice.
As KMRobbo replied above, unfortunately research has found that immunity can wane quite fast, reported on BBC radio 4 this morning.
"Levels of protective antibodies in people wane "quite rapidly" after coronavirus infection, say researchers.
The Imperial College London team found the number of people testing positive for antibodies has fallen by 26% between June and September.
They say immunity appears to be fading and there is a risk of catching the virus multiple times."
They add that T-cells may also play a role, but warn that antibodies "tend to be highly predictive of who is protected."
bbc.co.uk/news/health-54696873
That's true, antibodies do decline. However on the BBC World at One, they had a top immunologist on (Prof Peter Openshaw) who said that the key measure is of antibody levels in the nose and throat. The standard tests only measure antibody levels in blood plasma, as a proxy, as it's much easier. The nose and throat levels could be substantially different.
He also said that many scientists consider the T cell response to be arguably more important, and the T cell memory lasts a lot longer than antibodies.
So I come back to the point that the chance of one of the tests being a false positive is far greater than the chance of someone catching Covid twice. Having said that, it can't be ruled out, simply because we don't know enough about the immunology of Covid yet.
Also in the news today, but not mentioned by the BBC: the number of deaths in the UK from Covid19 have doubled each fortnight for the last six weeks. That would predict well over a thousand deaths per week in two weeks time . . .
Be careful, people.
More and more people in the US are getting Covid twice. Not testing for it twice, getting it twice. Studies are showing that antibodies may only protect you for 3 or 4 months maximum and you can indeed get Covid again. Covid is a coronavirus which is the same family as the common cold viruses. Many people can get several colds in a season, same principle; coronavirus antibodies may only protect from re-infection for a short time. That is why vaccine studies are using a 2 injection therapy protocol about a month apart, with a potential booster shot 6 months later.
Hey Everyone, quick update!!
A Friend's Heart Rate
No treatment offered for A F
think i need a shrink ?
GP with a difference
