Kinetics of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 infection antibody responses

Abstract

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has spread rapidly throughout the world, causing severe morbidity and mortality. Since the first reports of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in late 2019, research on the characteristics of specific humoral immunity against SARS-CoV-2 in patients with COVID-19 has made great progress. However, our knowledge of persistent humoral immunity to SARS-CoV-2 infection is limited. The existence of protective immunity after infection will affect future transmission and disease severity. Therefore, it is important to gather knowledge about the kinetics of antibody responses. In this review, we summarize the information obtained so far on the characteristics and kinetics of the SARS-CoV-2 infection of specific humoral immune response, especially in neutralizing antibodies and their relationship with disease severity. In addition, with the emergence of variants of concern, we summarize the neutralizing effect of specific humoral immunity on variants of concern after the initial SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccination.

Determinants of Anti-S Immune Response at 9 Months after COVID-19 Vaccination in a Multicentric European Cohort of Healthcare Workers—ORCHESTRA Project

“…A mild decrease in antibody level was observed from first to seventh month in the Bologna cohort, with an overall persistence of vaccine-induced immunization. These results are consistent with previous findings from the ORCHESTRA study, including a partially overlapping set of cohorts [15,16], and corroborate previous literature on the topic [17][18][19][20].…”

“…About 2.5% of the study participants got infected after the first dose according to PCR tests. According to our results, and consistently with a large body of literature [15][16][17][18][19], previous infection enhanced the likelihood of high levels of antibodies against COVID-19 in vaccinated subjects, which, in detail, we found to be particularly high in HCW who had more recent infections (i.e., breakthrough infection (BI) HCW) and who had multiple exposures to the virus (i.e., HCW who got infected both before the first dose and between the first and the second dose).…”

“…A recent review described the kinetics of the COVID-19 vaccine-induced immune response [17]. The authors mentioned how antibody titers were found to decline to 64% of the initial level at 9 months from infection in Wuhan patients, and were decreased by 70% compared to 1-month serology after 1 year [17].…”

“…A recent review described the kinetics of the COVID-19 vaccine-induced immune response [17]. The authors mentioned how antibody titers were found to decline to 64% of the initial level at 9 months from infection in Wuhan patients, and were decreased by 70% compared to 1-month serology after 1 year [17]. Neutralizing antibody levels were also reported to decline with time, together with their protective effect, but without a well-assessed relationship between the quantitative reduction and the decrease in their protection.…”

“…Neutralizing antibody levels were also reported to decline with time, together with their protective effect, but without a well-assessed relationship between the quantitative reduction and the decrease in their protection. Moreover, higher neutralizing antibody titers were measured in individuals with previous COVID-19 infection, being specifically associated with disease severity [17].…”