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Monday, February 17, 2020

Mad Monday and Thinking About Immunity

I have a feeling I might conk out in the middle of writing this blog post. I had PT after work and only felt the effects of the exercise midway through dinner. My physiotherapist had a hard time with me again today because I have really bad body coordination. She's had to break down every single step in the exercises she's been teaching me (including when to breathe). Now I know why I never really got into sports. I'm so lucky my physiotherapist is so patient with me.

I had lunch with my seatmate and his friend. They asked me how I was since I was a bit under the weather last week (lagnat laki) and of course we talked about the coronavirus. One thought that came up was whether one would have immunity to SARS if you've had it before. This came up because I read on this article that plasma from recovered patients can help treat sick patients.

I did some more reading and found an article on the New English Journal of Medicine citing a study on whether the antibodies stay in your body after recovering from SARS. Sadly the article said it diminishes, but the don't know whether it would be "adequate to protect a person from reinfection".

From my layman understanding, this means it doesn't act like you've been vaccinated from having it again in the future. I hope since there is another outbreak they can continue their studies. At best we should just follow what authorities have advised about proper hygiene to protect yourself -- wash your hands frequently, avoid touching your mouth/nose, don't scratch your eyes and cover your nose and mouth when you sneeze.

Our advantage today is we can easily access information online. We need to be mindful though about the sources we get information from. One other item I have read more about is whether I could pick up the virus in a chlorinated swimming pool. Yikes!

It's been a mad day today since I didn't get a good night's sleep. I was surprisingly productive today despite that, but I'm going to end this post now so I can get some zzzzzs.

Night night everyone. 

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