FALSE: DO NOT SHARE
Claim:
Patients who have recovered from COVID-19 are immune for life.
Answer:
Unconfirmed. COVID-19 immunity and its longevity have not been proven.
FURTHER INFORMATION
In a video on YouTube, Professor Delores Cahill from the University of Dublin, who is a specialist in immunology, and also chairman of the right wing Irish Freedom Party, claims that people who have recovered from COVID-19 are immune for life from catching the illness again.
This is unconfirmed, whilst antibodies to the coronavirus are found in the blood of people who have recovered from Covid-19, it has not been confirmed if people have immunity to the coronavirus or how long immunity confers protection. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there is currently no evidence that people who have recovered from COVID-19 and have antibodies are protected from a second infection.
As this coronavirus strain is new to science, much is still unknown about it and needs to be studied, such as how it interacts with the adaptive immune response, where antibodies prevent the virus from replicating and allow cells infected with the virus to be targeted for destruction. Whilst research is being conducted, some think that immunity to coronavirus may last from a few months to a few years.
Professor Paul Hunter of the University of East Anglia told the BBC that “the question is not whether you become immune, it’s how long for. It almost certainly will not last for life”, and Professor Daniel M Davis, Professor of Immunology at the University of Manchester, told Channel 4 that “some level of immunity is almost certain but we don’t know how protective exactly, nor how long protection would last”.
SOURCES
World Health Organization (WHO): “Immunity passports” in the context of COVID-19
Professor Paul Hunter in BBC News: Coronavirus immunity: Can you catch it twice?
Professor Daniel M Davis in Channel 4 FactCheck: Are you immune if you’ve had coronavirus?
Origins of Claim
FULL TEXT OF CLAIM
“There’s two major things that I want to say to people. First of all there should be a lot of hope that this virus is not as dangerous as it has been shown to be, major issues like the media are reporting the number of cases, when actually someone who has had the virus, like me I had this virus in January and February. Your immune system clears it after ten days, then you are immune for life… That is important because the way it has been done in the media is a case is something dangerous, but if you are immune for life then you should be able to function in the world.“
