Interesting that for both doctors who suffered a second coronavirus infection 4 months after the first, the second coronavirus infection was worse (the second time was bad enough to require hospitalization). See timecode 13:05.
You might expect the residual antibodies remaining from the first infection to offer some protection, and thus expect that if anything, the second infection would be milder than the first.
Normally it takes the body around 3 days to figure out how to make the right antibodies to target a new infection, during which time the virus gets the upper hand. But once the body has learnt to make antibodies, it remembers how to make them for decades. So even if antibody levels are low, the body should be able to instantly start producing lots of coronavirus antibodies the second time the person is exposed to the virus (rather than the 3 day wait to make antibodies from scratch). So you would have thought a prior coronavirus infection would offer some protection, even with antibody levels being low, as antibody production should be at the ready.
Yet the infection was worse second time around in these two twice-infected doctors.
Of course this is just two cases, so we cannot draw any hard conclusions from that. However, whistleblower doctors in China are also saying that coronavirus infection is worse the second time around (although they blame the medications for this: "the meds they use are damaging their heart tissue, and when they get it the second time, the antibody doesn’t help but makes it worse, and they die a sudden death from heart failure"). Whether it is the meds is an open question; but in any case, they are observing that infections are worse second time around.
Looks like coronavirus may be the diligent assassin which does not give up after a first failed attempt at killing you: this assassin may come back for you 4 months later when your antibodies have subsided, and on the second occasion, its homicidal skills may have become honed and deadlier. And should this assassin not kill you on the second try, there is always the third attempt, and the fourth attempt...
So it seems the only way out of this pandemic is the vaccine, which we hope will create long-lasting antibody protection.
Edited by Hip, 14 July 2020 - 04:24 PM.