Brazil strain can reinfect Covid-19 survivors: Study

A new study suggested that the coronavirus variant that emerged in Brazil is able to reinfect survivors of coronavirus infection.

The study, published in the journal Lancet, revealed that Brazil variant -- P.1 -- can evade the immunity developed against the wild-type coronavirus.

This comes as many studies have already claimed that the Covid-19 vaccines show limited efficacy against the new strains of the virus burgeoned in Brazil and South Africa.

For the study, the researchers examined the neutralizing ability of antibodies in plasma samples taken from survivors of Covid-19 caused by earlier versions of the virus.

The plasma "had the six-fold less neutralizing capacity" against the P.1 variant than against earlier virus versions, the researchers noted in the study.

"Lower neutralization capacity of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies and partial immunity against new variants suggests that reinfection could occur in convalescent or even vaccinated individuals," the authors added.

Another paper published on a similar subject in the journal medRxiv revealed that some of the same researchers estimated that among every 100 survivors of Covid-19 due to earlier virus versions, 25-to-60 could become reinfected if exposed to the P.1 variant. This could be because their antibodies could not protect them.