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Hard to underscore the importance of this beautiful study by @eguia_rachel and colleagues (see @jbloom_lab's great thread).
The bottom line is that coronavirus "reinfections" don't occur b/c we don't mount durable immune responses, but because the viruses evolve to evade them. https://twitter.com/jbloom_lab/status/1339939720558563328
The bottom line is that coronavirus "reinfections" don't occur b/c we don't mount durable immune responses, but because the viruses evolve to evade them. https://twitter.com/jbloom_lab/status/1339939720558563328
This study looked back almost 40 years to see how 229E, a common cold coronavirus, evolved relative to antibodies collected at different times. Antibodies collected recently neutralized all historical 229E isolates, but those in the past couldn't neutralize more recent 229E CoVs.
This shows that we produce durable long-lasting antibodies to CoV infection, but the virus evolves to escape them. So we can rest assured our immune systems deal with CoVs the same way as with most other viruses. It also suggests we need to carefully monitor SARS-CoV-2 evolution.
Before you say ZOMG THE VIRUS IS MUTATING!!!, this is actually a normal thing that all viruses do, especially RNA viruses like CoVs. We know how to deal with it: surveillance. Once vaccines are widely available & the pandemic ends, we'll need to see if escape mutants emerge.
The good news is that the vaccines in late-stage trials can be modified easily and rapidly to accommodate any mutants that may be capable of evading vaccine-generated immunity. And CoVs evolve more slowly than other RNA viruses, so we'll have time to do that if necessary.
So in summary, this is incredibly useful information that increases our understanding of what we might expect from SARS-CoV-2, and helps us prepare to control the virus long-term. Congratulations and thanks to the authors for this excellent work.
