When COVID strikes twice in less than 3 months
BOSTON - Don Seiffert and his family were dealt a glancing blow from COVID in May. "It was actually no big deal," Seiffert said.
After isolation, Seiffert decided it was time to have some fun and flew to Ireland to enjoy a mask free vacation. He returned home to some rough symptoms.
"We got back from Ireland on Friday. Obviously, I was pretty jetlagged. I started having a sore throat Saturday night and by Sunday I was like prone on my bed and wasn't able to get up very easily," Seiffert said.
Seiffert and his wife tested positive for COVID again in less than three months. His experience highlighting the dilemma with the latest subvariants of COVID.
"Those kinds of reinfections in a short period of time are definitely more common than they were in the pre-omicron era, but they are not the norm," said Dr. Shira Doron, Hospital Epidemiologist at Tufts Medical Center.
Doron says studies suggest that infection from earlier subvariants of omicron provide good protection from the latest subvariants.
"BA.1 and BA.2 efficacy against reinfection from BA.4, BA.5 is pretty high like over 80%," she said.
However, it is difficult to tell how long COVID immunity lasts and how many people are being re-infected because every person's immune response is different and because individuals are not tested for their specific subvariants.
That is why Doron says individuals need to make assessments about their own risk.
"The degree to which individuals in our society are at risk is so variable," she said.
Seiffert says he would do Ireland again, but maybe this time in a mask.
"It would have saved us a whole lot of the headache and any lingering symptoms even though it still wasn't terrible for me," Seiffert said.
