Covid again within 90 days??

[Charliealphatangorara]

Has anyone got coronavirus twice within a short space of time? We had it 6 weeks ago and have just found out we are close contacts (one hour spent sitting next to the person) of someone who has tested positive. T & t say not to test unless we get symptoms as the result will likely be positive even if negative.

You won't be able to do PCRs again within 90 days of having had Covid.

It’s not impossible, it happened to a mum at our school. She had it mildly in late July/early August & quite badly in late Oct/Nov. She didn’t think the second time was covid until she completely lost her smell & taste again after getting it fully back within a couple weeks of the first infection. She ended up in hospital ☹️ But doctors told her she was in a tiny, tiny, tiny minority getting it again so soon.

From my understanding, PCR’s can pick up dead infection up to 90 days post covid due to their sensitivity. But LFT’s are unlikely to pick up the dead virus particles & recognise it as covid. You could quickly try a test now while you have no symptoms & if it’s negative, you know any subsequent positive lateral flows are probably accurate!

The data coming from ZOE suggests that 1 in 5 people who had a confirmed positive case didn't go on to develop post-infection antibodies (this was in a group of people who'd already had their two vaccine doses, I think, and then got Covid). The correlation was that people with more severe and greater number of different symptoms were more likely to get antibodies.

So if you've had it mildly, you might well get it again fairly soon.

And there is nothing stopping you from having a PCR test within 90 days if you think you're symptomatic! Many people found that they were testing negative very soon after having Covid, it's by no means certain that you'd still be throwing out positive tests 3 months later. If I'd had a mild case and two months later thought I was symptomatic again, damn right I'd be testing.

Thanks. I've done a LFT as an experiment and it's negative. Mind you, so were my LFTs when I actually had covid!

Hope you get an answer to this OP as I'm in the same boat! I had Covid at the end of August and then ex-DP came down with it on Sunday after visiting us. I started coughing on Monday and had a similar immune response that I'd had when I'd had Covid (sore joints, plantar fasciitis, increased anxiety etc) - I called 119 on Monday who weren't sure but said not to test but just self-isolate for 10 days. I then spoke with pharmacist who recommended testing as displaying symptoms so sent a PCR on Monday but still haven't had results. Had been hoping to go back to work this week and if it wasn't for the close contact I would have just thought I had a cold so pretty sure it isn't Covid but need to be sure!

My LFT was negative too but like you they were for the initial 4 days of covid infection back in August!

@debbieBustamove will you come back and update us when you do get PCR results? Hope they arrive soon, that's a very long time!

@Charliealphatangorara - PCR came in at 03:20 this morning! Negative! I'm about 86 days post positive Covid test from August but 90 days from the day my symptoms started so not sure if that makes it within the 90 day timeframe but there you go. So pleased I'm not dealing with it again, first time round was bad enough!

@DebbieBustamove that's good news!