4 replies to this topic

[geo12the]

"Negative SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in patients with positive immunohistochemistry for spike protein in pityriasis rosea-like eruptions"

 

https://onlinelibrar....1111/jdv.18186

 

This letter publication has gone under the radar but seems fascinating. Since the COVID epidemic the number of skin lesions has increased but many of the effected people test negative in serology tests for COVID. End of last year my husband and I and my mom on the opposite coast experienced unexplained rashes but were otherwise not sick. This letter describes cases where people with these symptoms test negative in COVID serology tests but positive when skin endothelium  is tested for the virus. How weird is that?

[Daniel Cooper]

That's interesting. It's not terribly uncommon to get cutaneous infections of respiratory viruses or other systemic viral infections. Usually the cutaneous version is less severe and can offer some immuno protection against the full blown infection.

 

At one time, intentional cutaneous infection with real smallpox virus was used to protect against full blown smallpox. They would apply material from a smallpox lesion from an active patient to a cut in the skin of the person being inoculated. If memory serves, the risk of dying from this was ~5%, versus about a 30% death rate from contracting smallpox normally. This was supplanted when Jenner discovered that cowpox offered cross immunity with a very small risk of serious disease or death.

Edited by Daniel Cooper, 28 April 2022 - 02:06 PM.

[pamojja]

Hmm, interesting. I've seem to have gotten a rash on legs. Which I don't remember ever to have had.

[geo12the]

That's interesting. It's not terribly uncommon to get cutaneous infections of respiratory viruses or other systemic viral infections. Usually the cutaneous version is less severe and can offer some immuno protection against the full blown infection.

 

At one time, intentional cutaneous infection with real smallpox virus was used to protect against full blown smallpox. They would apply material from a smallpox lesion from an active patient to a cut in the skin of the person being inoculated. If memory serves, the risk of dying from this was ~5%, versus about a 30% death rate from contracting smallpox normally. This was supplanted when Jenner discovered that cowpox offered cross immunity with a very small risk of serious disease or death.

 

I think this story is one that has not been investigated enough. It raises lots of questions: If your skin is inoculated with COVID but it doesn't get into your respiratory tract can you get a cutaneous infection and not respiratory symptoms? That may be what is going on here. My husband and I got a nasty rash end of last year, husband thinks it from the gym- we would go masked but maybe our skin was exposed to COVID from contact with the weight machines and equipment. With me the rash started  as lines of raised itchy-hot welts on my right thumb in the area between the nail and knuckle. It spread to my legs and arms. Husband had the same thing. My mom on the opposite coast had the same thing at the same time.   

[Daniel Cooper]

It's certainly possible to get a cutaneous infection that doesn't go systemic or end up in the respiratory system. For viral and bacterial infections.

 

For instance, you can get a cutaneous anthrax infection (a bacteria) and it's no huge deal if treated. You get nasty skin lesions and black ulcerations. With antibiotics your chance of dying is low.

 

A respiratory infection of anthrax on the other hand can frequently be fatal even it treatment is attempted. It progresses so fast that you can be dead within 48 hours of symptom onset.

 

As mentioned before, cutaneous smallpox infection has about a 5% mortality rate, and usually had fairly mild symptoms. Airborne infection by smalpox was fatal about 30% of the time, and if it didn't kill you it frequently left you seriously disfigured from scaring from thousands of lesions on the skin.

 

A lot of it has to do with how much access the infecting organism has to the major systems of the body and therefore how rapidly it can propagate. The first few layers of the skin are not heavily vascularized so the infection has a limited access to the bloodstream and spreading to the rest of the body and becoming systemic, it therefore spreads slowly. This allow the immune system some time to start making antibodies and mounting a defense.  The respiratory tract on the other hand has extensive access to the bloodstream. Therefore an infectious agent can enter the lungs, quickly get access to the bloodstream, and can start reproducing throughout the body before the immune system has much time to start to react.