Asymptomatic despite being immunocompromised, positive for three and a half months and contagious for 70 days.
Something that was waiting for us could happen, but it had never been reported before.
This is the case of a 71-year-old woman from Washington State, reported in Cell by scholars from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
"As the virus continues to spread," says senior study author Vincent Munster, "more people with a range of immunosuppressive disorders will be infected, and it is important to understand how SARS-CoV-2 behaves in this population."
The patient, 71, was immunocompromised due to chronic lymphocytic leukemia and acquired hypogammaglobulinemia.
He has never shown any symptoms of COVID-19.
It was found that she was infected with the virus when she was screened after hospitalization for severe anemia, because doctors found she was a resident of a rehabilitation facility with numerous cases.
The laboratory began studying samples that were regularly collected by the patient.
It was found that the infectious virus continued to be present for at least 70 days after the first positive test and the woman did not completely clear the virus until day 105. Scholars believe that the patient remained contagious for so long because the her compromised immune system never allowed her to develop an antibody response.
Blood tests showed that his body was never able to make antibodies.
She was also treated with convalescent plasma, but Munster does not think the treatment worked because of the low concentration of antibodies.
Despite the inability to mount an antibody response, he has never developed COVID-19. Munster says that, as far as he knows, this is the longest reported case of those who have been actively infected with SARS-CoV-2 while remaining asymptomatic.
"We have seen similar cases with the flu and Middle East respiratory syndrome, which is also caused by a coronavirus - he concludes - we expect to see more reports like ours in the future".