• Another case of reinfection with SARS-CoV-2, confirmed by viral sequencing, is reported in a 25-year-old in Nevada, who had a sore throat, cough, nausea and diarrhea during the first infection; after two negative test results, he became reinfected and was hospitalized with pneumonia. Experts said that the severe symptoms could have been caused by different things: exposure to a massive dose of virus, or antibody-dependent enhancement (when the immune response worsens symptoms), or because no antibodies were produced after the first infection (unfortunately, no antibody testing was performed after the initial infection). Sources 1,2,3
• The US National Association of County and City Health Officials and the Big Cities Health Coalition, representing 3,000 local health departments and 30 of the largest urban health departments send a letter to CDC head Dr Robert Redfield and Admiral Brett Giroir, the US coronavirus testing czar. The letter expressed serious concerns about the new testing recommendation (that close contacts of people with COVID-19 who are asymptomatic “do not necessarily need testing”), and asked for restoration of the previous testing recommendation, which encouraged testing for all close contacts of people with COVID-19, including asymptomatic people. The letter cited the lack of evidence supporting the new testing recommendation, noting that up to 40% of COVID-19 infections are attributed to asymptomatic transmission, and describes it as an obstacle to fighting the epidemic and “…haphazard decision-making… [that] costs lives and livelihoods and impacts the standing of health officials across the country.” Sources 1,2
• Researchers in South Korea report that symptoms in children with COVID-19 are easily overlooked, and that asymptomatic children have detectable levels of SARS-CoV-2, suggesting that they can transmit the virus. Source
