Thread by @DrEricDing

⚠️Worrisome—“These findings suggest that #SARSCoV2 infection damages the CD8+ T cell response, an effect **akin to that observed in studies showing long-term damage to the immune system after infection with hepatitis C or #HIV**.” ~@NIH study! #LongCOVID
nih.gov/news-events/ne…

2) The magnitude and quality of a key immune cell’s response to vaccination with two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine were considerably lower in people with prior SARS-CoV-2 infection compared to people without prior infection, a study has found.

3) In addition, the level of this key immune cell that targets the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein was substantially lower in unvaccinated people with COVID-19 than in vaccinated people who had never been infected.

4) Importantly, people who recover from SARS-CoV-2 infection and then get vaccinated are more protected than people who are unvaccinated.

These findings, which suggest that the virus damages an important immune-cell response, were published today in the journal Immunity.

5) we suspected immunity damage as early as mid 2020—“In a disturbing parallel to HIV, the coronavirus can cause a depletion of important immune cells, recent studies found.” #COVID

nytimes.com/2020/06/26/hea…