With country after country forced into lockdowns, there is an argument going around that those who have recovered from the novel coronavirus infection should be allowed to resume work. The underlying logic for such an assertion is that a person cured of Covid-19 has the immunity against the novel coronavirus or SARS-CoV-2.
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Simply put, a person does not get coronavirus infection at least for few months, the arguments goes. However, there is not enough scientific data to reach such a conclusion though.
Let us look at the science. The shape and size of a pathogen determines the consistency and effectiveness of the response from the human body’s immune system. The antibodies produced by body’s immune system jams the pathogen making them ineffective. The same happens in the case of coronavirus.
As a general rule, viruses are difficult to tackle in an infectious outbreak because they keep changing their physical and genetic makeup, that is, they mutate very fast.
This makes drugs against bacteria very effective and against viruses a compromise. However, some of the viruses, like the ones causing rabies, have remained fairly stable making drugs effective against them.
If body – including cases of drug-induced immunity – produces antigens for a particular strand of virus, they don’t work against a mutant version of the same virus.
The novel coronavirus has also been found to be mutating, with varying rates. This means, even if a recovered coronavirus patient develops immunity for one variety of SARS-CoV-2, it does not protect her from a mutant version.
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