A woman from the USA who could not get vaccinated because of her previous illnesses was infected with the coronavirus for almost a year.
Baltimore - An infection with the coronavirus is still a frightening scenario one and a half years after the start of the pandemic. Only the advancing vaccination rate and the associated lower probability of a severe course of the disease in those who are fully vaccinated ensure a little relaxation for those affected.
However, vaccination is not possible for all risk groups and how dangerous an infection can be for members of these groups is shown by a case from the USA.
Coronaviruses: Vaccination not possible - American was corona-positive for 335 days
A woman in her 40s from the US state of Maryland, who was unable to get vaccinated due to her medical history, contracted the coronavirus last year and only recovered from the infection this year after a total of 335 days. This is reported by a research team led by virologist Elodie Ghedin in a previously published scientific article.
As the researchers report, the patient had developed lymph gland cancer about three years ago and was treated with a so-called CAR-T cell therapy.
This therapy then destroyed not only cancer cells, but also the patient's B cells, which are responsible for the production of antibodies in the blood.
In addition, the patient is diabetic (type 2) and therefore belongs to the risk group for a severe course anyway.
Coronavirus: After a month, she was discharged from the hospital - but the infection remained
After the patient was admitted to a hospital in Maryland with a corona infection, she was initially treated with serum therapy. She was given the plasma of patients who had a high level of antibodies. The measures had an effect, so that the woman could be discharged from the hospital after just one month.
The PCR tests then carried out on the patient remained positive, even if the Ct value, which measures the size of the viral load, leveled off between 37 and 38.
According to the RKI, a Ct value of over 30 is associated with “the loss of cultivability.” This usually means that the virus can no longer be reproduced from these samples in the laboratory.
Based on the patient's Ct values, the doctors treated assumed that the infection would continue to subside.
Coronavirus: American woman infected for almost a year - treatment with remdesivir drug
On the 242nd day after infection, however, viral load could still be detected in the patient who had also developed inflammation of the lung tissue. Once again in the hospital, the doctors therefore started steroid treatment. Forty days later, the woman's respiratory problems increased again, which is why she needed additional oxygen treatment. The Ct value was 27.5 and thus again below the limit of 30.
Then, 313 days after infection, doctors began administering the drug Remdesivir and renewed serum therapy, which ultimately succeeded in stopping the patients' coronavirus infection after 335 days.
Her complaints continued to decrease over the next three months.
According to the researchers, it can be ruled out that the woman was infected again with the coronavirus in the observed period, since the virus type was the same from the beginning to the end of the infection.
Coronavirus: Longer infections as the cause of new virus variants?
However, in the opinion of many researchers, such long-lasting infections in patients also pose a threat to society, as the coronavirus can form new mutations in the body over a longer period of time.
Patients with a long-term corona infection are therefore also a possible source for the large number of new variants of the corona virus.
The case once again underlines the relevance of protecting risk groups for whom vaccination is not possible from infection with the coronavirus as well as possible.
An infection can not only have devastating effects on those affected, it can also have a significant impact on the pandemic as a whole.
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