CDC Study Finds Nursing Home Residents Reinfected With Worst Case Of Covid

A new CDC study has found that some elderly people who apparently recovered from the coronavirus later contracted a second, even worse infection, indicating that asymptomatic or mild cases may not offer much protection against re-infection with Covid -19.

The study, published Thursday in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, looked at two separate outbreaks that occurred three months apart at a skilled nursing facility in Kentucky. Between mid-July and mid-August, 20 residents and five health workers tested positive for the virus, according to the study.

The second outbreak between late October and early December was worse – 85 residents and 43 health workers tested positive for the virus. Of the residents who tested positive in the first outbreak and who were still living at the facility, five of them tested positive a second time more than 90 days from their first positive test.

Although re-infections from Covid-19 do occur, they are usually rare.

Thanks to frequent surveillance after the first outbreak, all five residents underwent at least four negative tests between outbreaks, which suggests they were potentially reinfected with the virus later, according to the study. Reinfection means that a person who had Covid-19 recovered and then had it again, according to the CDC.

“The history of exposure, including the timing of the roommates’ infections and the new onset of symptoms during the second outbreak, suggests that the second positive RT-PCR results represented new infections after patients apparently cleared the disease. first infection, ”wrote Alyson Cavanaugh, one of the researchers who conducted the study.

While only two of the five residents showed mild symptoms in the first outbreak, the five potentially re-infected residents showed signs of illness the second time around. The two residents who reported symptoms in the first outbreak “experienced more severe symptoms during the second infectious episode,” according to the study. One resident was hospitalized and subsequently died.

According to the study researchers, this was “remarkable” because it suggests the possibility that people who have mild or no symptoms during their first infections “may not produce an immune response robust enough to prevent reinfection.” The results “suggest the possibility that the disease may be more severe with a second infection.”

“The results of this study underscore the importance of maintaining public health mitigation and protection strategies that reduce the risk of transmission, even among people with a history of COVID-19 infection,” Cavanaugh wrote .

The study noted some limitations. Because the samples were not stored, the researchers were unable to perform genomic sequencing, a lab technique that breaks down the virus’s genetic code, to confirm reinfection, the researchers said. Additionally, “no additional test results exist to support the initial test result as a true positive” during the first outbreak, they said.

The risk of reinfection for the general population is still believed to be low, but residents of nursing homes may be particularly at risk given their community life and high number of exposures, according to the study.

“Qualified nursing facilities should use strategies to reduce the risk of transmission of SARS-CoV-2 among all residents, including those who have previously been diagnosed with COVID-19,” Cavanaugh wrote.