A 71-year-old woman who tested positive for coronavirus but never experienced any symptoms remained infectious for 70 days, according to new research.
While the woman has not been identified, she did have underlying health issues including leukemia, anemia and chronic leukocytosis, reported the New York Post.
She first tested positive on March 2nd after being hospitalized for severe anemia, according to the study published in the journal Cell.
While isolated in the hospital, the woman was tested 14 times over the course of 15 weeks and each time received a positive result. She remained asymptomatic the entire time.
Routine swabs disclosed the novel virus remained in her system for at least 70 days after her first positive test result, the researchers noted.
After 105 days, the woman finally tested negative after four consecutive swabs.
“At the time we started this study, we really didn’t know much about the duration of virus shedding,” said researcher Vincent Munster, a virologist at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, in a statement. “As this virus continues to spread, more people with a range of immuno-suppressing disorders will become infected, and it’s important to understand how SARS-CoV-2 behaves in these populations.”
On average, most COVID-positive patients have been shown to be infectious for approximately 8 days, with other studies indicating it can last between 20 to 37 days, the Daily News noted.
The researchers believe the woman’s compromised immune system made it harder to vanquish the virus from her system and so she never developed enough antibodies to fight it.
“Although it is difficult to extrapolate from a single patient, our data suggest that long-term shedding of infectious virus may be a concern in certain immuno-compromised patients,” wrote the researchers.
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