How Can You Avoid Covid Reinfection This Winter?
By Helen Chandler-Wilde
Sharon Hughes was upset when she tested positive for Covid last winter. Besides the splitting headache, it meant that her plans to go on holiday to Lanzarote were cancelled. She postponed the holiday to July and, in the spring, she got her vaccinations.
She never expected that the holiday would be cancelled again – for exactly the same reasons. At the end of June, the 52-year-old was shocked to once again test positive for Covid; a complete surprise given she was fully vaccinated and assumed she had a natural level of immunity from having had the virus.
“To have it a second time was a real surprise... I don’t usually get poorly, I don’t get colds or anything”, says Hughes, a tutor from north Wales.
Hughes felt ill for around 10 days the second time she got Covid, with extreme fatigue and the same splitting headache. Thankfully, she is now fully recovered. “Given how poorly I was, I was really grateful for having had my vaccinations,” she says. “I dread to think how poorly I might have been if I hadn't had those injections.”
Hughes is not the only one to catch Covid multiple times. Research published by Yale last week shows that, less than a year and a half after your first infection, you can expect to get it again if you haven’t been vaccinated.
Even being double vaccinated doesn’t make you bulletproof against Covid. Although the vaccines offer very good protection against catching Covid, this wanes over time. An international study published this summer found that the Pfizer vaccine was about 84 per cent effective against Covid after six months, compared to around 91 per cent efficacy up till that point.
Dr Nighat Arif, a GP and ambassador for the UN’s Team Halo vaccine project, says that our surprise at getting ill even after vaccination is often down to a misunderstanding about how vaccines work. They don’t stop your body from coming into contact with the Covid virus, she says, but they can help you to prepare. “Vaccines get the immune system ready,” she says. “You will still get the virus... but the immune system is ready and can fight it off so you’re not so ill that you have to go to the hospital.”
The preparedness that comes with a vaccine will also help you to avoid getting long Covid, she says. “Because you’re ready for the virus you don't get long Covid, you don’t still have a cough six months on or chronic fatigue which you [might] do if you didn’t have the protection.”
Arif knows this not just from a medical point of view, but also from a personal one: she had suspected Covid at the start of the pandemic, then had it again after she was fully vaccinated. The first time, in February 2020, she felt very ill with headaches, aches and a complete loss of sense of smell and taste. But the second time around, in July this year, her symptoms were mild. “Except for a headache and aches and pains [my husband and I] didn’t have much”, she says. “I totally think it’s because the vaccine helped us.”
The good news is that vaccines still seem to offer strong protection from serious illness over time. That means that even if you do still catch Covid after being vaccinated, you are less likely to be very ill. The same international study that found Pfizer efficacy dropped over time against getting Covid also said vaccines were still 97 per cent effective against severe disease six months on.
So, what to do to protect yourself against getting Covid for the second, or maybe even third or fourth time? You could think about ways to support your body’s natural immunity. Arif recommends looking after your mental health and wellbeing: decades of research show that high levels of stress weaken your body’s ability to fight infections. “Keeping a check on your mental health is really important…[it] impacts on how good your immune system is at fighting things,” she says.
She points to the mental health information on the NHS’s One You resources as being a good starting point or going for just a 10-minute walk outside in nature to destress.
Arif also recommends keeping your alcohol consumption to a minimum: research shows that heavy drinking can damage many parts of your immune system, including the lining of your lungs which is important for fighting respiratory infections.
If you smoke, stopping or cutting down can be good too, she says. Nicotine is thought to suppress your immune system, as well as reducing your lung function.
Otherwise, the number one thing is to get your booster Covid jab when you are asked to. A study published this week found that a third shot of the Pfizer vaccine gave 95.6 per cent efficacy against Covid, compared to two doses and a placebo. “The best thing is to please make sure you get your vaccine,” says Arif. – The Telegraph
