Filenews 19 March 2021
As the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic continues around the globe and an increasing proportion of the world's population comes into contact with SARS-CoV-2, a key question that is reasonably raised is whether Covid-19 disease offers protection against re-infection with SARS-CoV-2.
The doctors of the Therapeutic Clinic of the Medical School of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Theodora Psaltopoulou, Giannis Danasis, Panos Malandrakis and Thanos Dimopoulos (rector of the EKPA) summarize the relevant publication of C.H.Hansen and collaborators in the reputable scientific inspection The Lancet on 17 March 2021 (Christian Holm Hansen et al. Assessment of protection against refection with SARS-CoV-2 among 4 million PCR-tested individuals in Denmark in 2020 : a population-level observational study).
Extensive PCR population checks for SARS-CoV-2 were carried out in Denmark in 2020.
During the whole year, 10.6 million PCR tests were carried out on some 4 million citizens, who make up 69% of the Danish population.
The analysis did not include those citizens who experienced a positive PCR test for the first time between the two main waves of Covid-19 (first wave: March-May 2020, second wave: September-December 2020), as well as those who died before the second wave.
During the first wave before June 2020, 533,381 citizens were checked, of whom 11,727 (2.2%) were surveyed. positive PCR test.
Of these, 525,339 were available for retesting in the second wave, with a positivity rate in the first wave of 2.1%.
It is worth noting that 72 people from this group of citizens (0.65%) tested positive for PCR again in the second wave of the pandemic in Denmark.
In contrast, 16,819 citizens tested positive for PCR out of 514,271 who had a negative PCR test in the first wave (3.27%).
Overall, the individual history of previous Covid-19 infection offered 80.5% protection against RE-infection with SARS-CoV-2.
In the sub-analyses carried out, the degree of protection was significantly inferior (47.1%) between citizens aged 65 and over.
However, no differences were found in the degree of protection depending on the sex of the participant (male/female) or the length of time elapsed since the first PCR test (3-6 months/7 months or more).
In conclusion, this study argues that the risk of re-infection following a previous Covid-19 infection is not negligible, especially at older ages, over 65 years of age.
Therefore, vaccination is particularly important even for citizens who have an individual souvenir of past Covid-19 infection.
Source: news.in.gr
