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Virological assessment of hospitalized patients with COVID-2019
Open accessPublished version of a preprint
Abstract
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an acute infection of the respiratory tract that emerged in late 2019 1,2. Initial outbreaks in China involved 13.8% of cases with severe courses, and 6.1% of cases with critical courses 3. This severe presentation may result from the virus using a virus receptor that is expressed predominantly in the lung 2,4; the same receptor tropism is thought to have determined the pathogenicity-but also aided in the control-of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in 2003 5. However, there are reports of cases of COVID-19 in which the patient shows mild upper respiratory tract symptoms, which suggests the potential for pre- or oligosymptomatic transmission 6-8. There is an urgent need for information on virus replication, immunity and infectivity in specific sites of the body. Here we report a detailed virological analysis of nine cases of COVID-19 that provides proof of active virus replication in tissues of the upper respiratory tract. Pharyngeal virus shedding was very high during the first week of symptoms, with a peak at 7.11 × 10 8 RNA copies per throat swab on day 4. Infectious virus was readily isolated from samples derived from the throat or lung, but not from stool samples-in spite of high concentrations of virus RNA. Blood and urine samples never yielded virus. Active replication in the throat was confirmed by the presence of viral replicative RNA intermediates in the throat samples. We consistently detected sequence-distinct virus populations in throat and lung samples from one patient, proving independent replication. The shedding of viral RNA from sputum outlasted the end of symptoms. Seroconversion occurred after 7 days in 50% of patients (and by day 14 in all patients), but was not followed by a rapid decline in viral load. COVID-19 can present as a mild illness of the upper respiratory tract. The confirmation of active virus replication in the upper respiratory tract has implications for the containment of COVID-19.
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“It appears that peak viral loads can vary >100,000-fold between cases (Magleby et al., 2020; Wölfel et al., 2020)”
From Adaptive immunity to SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 (2021) · cites this paper as Wölfel et al., 2020
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“Clinical reports suggest that infection with CoV-2 is associated with high rates of disturbances in smell and taste perception, including anosmia (8-13).”
From Non-neuronal expression of SARS-CoV-2 entry genes in the olfactory system suggests mechanisms underlying COVID-19-associated anosmia (2020) · cites this paper as [10]
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Metadata
- Authors
- Wölfel, R., Corman, V. M., Guggemos, W., Seilmaier, M., Zange, S., Müller, M. A., Niemeyer, D., Jones, T. C., Vollmar, P., Rothe, C., Hoelscher, M., Bleicker, T., Brünink, S., Schneider, J., Ehmann, R., Zwirglmaier, K., Drosten, C., & Wendtner, C.
- Affiliations
- Institut für Mikrobiologie der Bundeswehr (DE)
- Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin (DE)
- München Klinik Schwabing (DE)
- University of Cambridge (GB)
- LMU Klinikum (DE)
- Corresponding author
- Drosten, Christian
- Wendtner, Clemens
- ORCID
- Venue
- Nature
- Published
- 2020-04-01
- Volume
- 581
- Issue
- 7809
- Pages
- 465-469
- ISSN
- 0028-0836 (ISSN-L)
- 1476-4687
- OpenAlex
- W3013893137
- Cited by
- 6,661
- References
- 37
- Citations by year
- 2026: 92 · 2025: 165 · 2024: 328 · 2023: 526 · 2022: 1091 · 2021: 2228 · 2020: 2219
- FWCI
- 199.03
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Update notices
- correction (2020-12-11)
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Nature (publishedVersion)
- medRxiv (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- European Commission (602525)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Infectious Diseases › SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 Research
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Infectious Diseases › COVID-19 Clinical Research Studies
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Infectious Diseases › SARS-CoV-2 detection and testing
- Keywords
- COVID-19 pandemic, SARS-CoV-2, upper respiratory tract, viral replication, seroconversion, viral load, hospitalized patients
- MeSH terms
- Seroconversion, Betacoronavirus, COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 Testing, Coronavirus Envelope Proteins, Antibodies, Viral, Base Sequence, Blood, Feces, Hospitalization, Humans, Immunoglobulin G, Immunoglobulin M, Lung, Pharynx, Pneumonia, Viral, RNA, Viral, Sputum, Urine, Viral Envelope Proteins, Virus Replication, Virus Shedding, Coronavirus Infections, Clinical Laboratory Techniques, Viral Load, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Pandemics
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