COVID 19, the ongoing global pandemic caused by the SARS-COV 2 virus, leads to symptoms like fever, chills, cough, loss of taste and smell, shortness of breath, chest pain, headache. In most cases, patients with mild symptoms can recover by staying home, taking medicines, and testing by COVID home sample collection. However, patients with serious symptoms should seek immediate medical attention. Since this is a new kind of virus, the biggest question is about immunity- whether infection can provide immunity. Natural immunity can occur from getting the COVID 19 vaccination or contracting the virus. There have been instances of reinfection but the intensity was mild due to immune memory and T cell mediation.

After COVID-19 develops, how does natural immunity work?

Humans have two kinds of immunity- Innate immunity and acquired immunity. Innate immunity is present from birth and acquired immunity is gained either from vaccination or contracting the disease. It has been discovered that people who recover from COVID-19 have antibodies that are proteins that circulate in the bloodstream and identify and neutralize foreign molecules such as viruses, helper T cells that aid in pathogen recognition, killer T cells that kill Pathogens, and B cells that produce antibodies.

Testing for COVID is extremely essential even if a person is asymptomatic. It can be done by submitting a sample for testing or by COVID home sample collection. These samples are often used for understanding the genome sequencing and the mutations of the virus.

According to recent research, for people who have recovered from COVID-19, the immunity can last for about 3 months to 5 years. When a considerable section of a society or the herd gets immune to a disease, the infection particle transmission from person to person becomes rare.

Most persons infected with COVID-19 generate an immune response within a few weeks, but it is still unclear how powerful or long that immune response is, or how it varies across individuals, as evident from their samples gathered by COVID home sample collection or otherwise. The antibody levels remained balanced over time, declining only after six to eight months after infection. However, asymptomatic contamination through SARS-CoV-2 can set off a weaker immune reaction than symptomatic contamination.

Re-acquiring the COVID-19 virus is similar to re-acquiring the viral infection that causes the common cold from year to year. COVID-19, on the other hand, has proven to be far more life-threatening. If a person is suspicious of contacting COVID, they should immediately get tested by COVID home sample collection or by visiting the testing centers. You can get tested from SpiceHealth at affordable prices and with accurate results.

Data supporting COVID 19 reinfection

Since the pandemic has begun, research has been carried out on the reinfection of Coronavirus. Following are details of the studies conducted and their findings:

• Research carried out by epidemiologists and community medicine experts from D Y Patil Medical College and Hospital found a 1.2% reinfection rate. Most importantly, the second round of Covid was mild. According to studies, up to 30% of people infected with COVID-19 had extremely low levels of neutralizing antibodies.
• Some studies suggest that reinfections are rare, and individuals who have recovered with COVID-19 have a decreased chance of reinfection. Natural immunity to COVID-19 gives protection for at least a year, similar to vaccine-induced protection.
• Periodic surveys of the population with immunity were done by the Indian Council of Medical Research. After the second wave finished in July, the fourth poll revealed that 67.4 percent of people aged six and up had antibodies. Only 64% of those with previously RT-PCR positive infection had detectable antibodies in the second survey. Immunity does not completely diminish even when antibody titers fall below the detection range of tests. As a result, the immune population was significantly higher than 67.4%, because many of the antibody-negative 32.6 percent had already been infected and had immunity.

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues, reinfection is likely to increase. More research is required to precisely quantify the risk of reinfection, particularly in the context of recent variants. Maintaining public fitness measures like social distancing, sanitizing, wearing masks and gloves that cut down transmission coupled with continual efforts to boost up vaccination globally is vital to the prevention of COVID-19 morbidity and mortality.