COVID-19 Antibodies May Last From Days To Years: Study Shows What It Depends On

COVID-19 Research: The research, published in The Lancet Microbe journal, noted that recovered patients with low levels of neutralising antibodies may still be protected from reinfection if they have robust immunity in the form of the body's T cells.

Antibodies against the novel coronavirus wane at different rates, lasting for mere days in some individuals, while persisting in others for decades, according to a new study which says COVID-19 severity could be a deciding factor in having longer-lasting protection against reinfection. The research, published in The Lancet Microbe journal, noted that recovered patients with low levels of neutralising antibodies may still be protected from reinfection if they have robust immunity in the form of the body's T cells. In the study, scientists, including those from Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore, followed 164 COVID-19 patients for six to nine months, analysing their blood for neutralising antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 virus, their T cells and immune system signalling molecules. They then used this information to train a machine learning algorithm to predict the trajectories of people's neutralising antibodies over time.