A major outstanding question in the coronavirus pandemic is how long immunity lasts after a patient recovers, as cases of re-infection have been reported.
The CDC currently advises that antibodies can provide protect for at least three months, which is not very long in the context of a pandemic.
“We still think that having had the infection, the probability of you getting it again is infinitesimal,” said Dr. Bob Wachter, Chair of the Department of Medicine at UCSF. “There have now been clearly documented cases of people getting a second infection but you can count them on a couple of hands.”
Dr. Wachter says this relatively immunity also seems to protect someone from transmitting the virus to another person.
“It appears that the resistance is both to you getting sick again and to you getting enough infection to then be able to spread it to a second person,” said Dr. Wachter, although he expressed that this does not mean people who have recovered can resume normal life.
“That’s not 100 percent certainty. It doesn’t mean people who have had the infection can be cavalier about masking or distancing, because there have been documented cases of second infection.”
However as the pandemic progresses and data piles up, it does suggest that at least in the short term, people who have recovered from the virus can feel relatively protected.