Rabat – A patient in the UK has passed away after suffering from COVID-19 for 500 days, a study has shown.
AFP reported that the patient had tested positive in mid-2020 and remained positive until his death 505 days later, according to Gaia Nebbia, co-author of the study.
According to the European Congress of Microbiology and Infectious Disease, the case is the longest of its kind. The congress will take place from April 23-26 to present the study’s findings.
The study focused on the mutations of the virus in infected patients for months.
The unfortunate patient’s identity has not been revealed.
Researchers from King’s College London and Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospital in London worked on the study, which takes into account nine immunocompromised patients with persistent infection with the COVID-19 virus.
The patients were all positive for at least eight weeks, two were positive for more than a year.
Four of the patients died, while the other four recovered.
The ninth patient was still infected at the start of 2022, 412 days after being tested positive for the first time, according to AFP.
Nebbia commented on the immunocompromised patients with persistent infection, saying that they have little chance of survival.
“New treatment strategies are urgently needed to end their infection,” the doctor told AFP.
According to the study, a patient with the virus carried 10 mutations that appeared in several major variants, including Omicron.
“We wanted to characterize the viral evolution in these individuals who could accumulate mutations during their present infection,” Nebbia added.
