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On his blog, Mercola.com, Dr. Joseph Mercola discusses the idea that many people have some resistance to COVID-19 because of other viruses they’ve encountered. He writes:
In related news, June 12, 2020, the Daily Mail,6 Science Times7 and others8 reported findings from a Singaporean study9 led by professor Antonio Bertoletti, an immunologist with the Duke-NUS Medical School, showing common colds caused by the betacoronaviruses OC43 and HKU1 might make you more resistant to SARS-CoV-2 infection, and that the resulting immunity might last as long as 17 years.
In addition to the common cold, OC43 and HKU1 — two of the most commonly encountered betacoronaviruses10 — are also known to cause bronchitis, acute exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and pneumonia in all age groups.11 As reported by the Daily Mail:12
“They share many genetic features with the coronaviruses Covid-19, MERS and SARS, all of which passed from animals to humans. Coronaviruses are thought to account for up to 30 percent of all colds but it is not known specifically how many are caused by the betacoronavirus types.
Now scientists have found evidence that some immunity may be present for many years due to the body’s ‘memory’ T-cells from attacks by previous viruses with a similar genetic make-up — even among people who have had no known exposure to Covid-19 or SARS …
Blood was taken from 24 patients who had recovered from Covid-19, 23 who had become ill from SARS and 18 who had never been exposed to either SARS or Covid-19 …
Half of patients in the group with no exposure to either Covid-19 or SARS possessed T-cells which showed immune response to the animal betacoronaviruses, Covid-19 and SARS. This suggested patients’ immunity developed after exposure to common colds caused by betacoronavirus or possibly from other as yet unknown pathogens.”
In other words, if you’ve beat a common cold caused by a OC43 or HKU1 betacoronavirus in the past, you may have a 50/50 chance of having defensive T-cells that can recognize and help defend against SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19. According to the researchers:13
“These findings demonstrate that virus-specific memory T-cells induced by betacoronavirus infection are long-lasting, which supports the notion that Covid-19 patients would develop long-term T-cell immunity. Our findings also raise the intriguing possibility that infection with related viruses can also protect from or modify the pathology caused by SARS-Cov-2.”
Statistician Believes Majority Are Resistant to COVID-19
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