Previous infection ‘protects for six months’

People who previously had Covid-19 are “highly unlikely” to become ill with the disease for at least six months, early findings suggest.

Researchers at Oxford University and Oxford University Hospitals (OUH) NHS Foundation Trust have found that healthcare workers who tested positive for antibodies to SarsCov-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, did not develop symptoms of the disease again.

The research, which is yet to be peer reviewed, is based on a study involving 12,180 healthcare workers employed at OUH.

Professor David Eyre of Oxford University’s Nuffield Department of Po p u l a t i o n He a l t h , said: “This ongoing study involving a large cohort of healthcare workers has shown that being infected with Covid-19 does offer protection against reinfection for most people for at least six months – we found no new symptomatic infections in any of the participants who had tested positive for antibodies, while 89 of those who had tested negative did contract the virus.

“This is really good news, because we can be confident that, at least in the short term, most people who get Covid-19 won’t get it again.

“We know from a previous study that antibody levels fall over time, but this latest study shows that there is some immunity in those who have been infected.

“We will continue to follow this cohort of staff carefully to see how long protection lasts and whether previous infection affects the severity of infection if people do get infected again.”

The team also found that no one among 1,246 healthcare workers with antibodies had a symptomatic infection.