4 THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT CORONAVIRUS RECOVERY

The coronavirus is certainly scary, yet despite a climbing death toll, the reality is the vast majority of people who come down with COVID-19 survive it. Just as the number of cases grows, so does another number: those who have recovered.

1. How does your body fight off COVID-19?

Once a person is exposed the coronavirus, the body starts producing proteins called antibodies to fight the infection. As these antibodies start to successfully contain the virus, symptoms usually begin to lessen and you start to feel better. Eventually, if all goes well, your immune system will destroy all of the virus in your system. A person who was infected with and survived a virus with no long-term health effects or disabilities has “recovered.”

2. What about immunity?

In general, once you have recovered from a viral infection, your body will keep cells called lymphocytes in your system. These cells“remember”viruses they’ve previously seen and can react quickly to fight them off again. If you are exposed to a virus you have already had, your antibodies will likely stop the virus before it starts causing symptoms. You become immune. This is the principle behind many vaccines.

Since this coronavirus is so new, scientists still don’t know whether people who recover from COVID-19 are immune to future infections of the virus. Doctors are finding antibodies in ill and recovered patients, and that indicates the development of immunity. But the question remains how long that immunity will last.

3. Why have so few people officially recovered in the U.S.?

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is being careful when deciding what it means to recover from COVID-19. Both medical and testing criteria must be met before a person is officially declared recovered.

Medically, a person must be fever-free without feverreducing medications for three consecutive days. They must show an improvement in their other symptoms, including reduced coughing and shortness of breath. And it must be at least seven full days since the symptoms began.

In addition, the CDC guidelines say that a person must test negative for the coronavirus twice, with the tests taken at least 24 hours apart. Only if both the symptom and testing conditions are met, is a person officially considered recovered by the CDC.

This second testing requirement is likely why there were so few official recovered cases in the U.S. until late March. As the number of available tests increases and the pandemic eventually slows in the country, more testing will be available for those who have appeared to recover.

4. Once a person has recovered, what can they do?

Knowing whether or not people are immune to COVID-19 after they recover is going to determine what individuals, communities and society at large can do going forward. If scientists can show that recovered patients are immune to the coronavirus, then a person who has recovered could in theory help support the health care system by caring for those who are infected.

Once communities pass the peak of the epidemic, the number of new infections will decline, while the number of recovered people will increase. As these trends continue, the risk of transmission will fall. Once the risk has fallen enough, community-level isolation and social distancing orders will begin to relax and businesses will start to reopen. Based on what other countries have gone through, it will be months until the risk of transmission is low in the U.S.