Case of a pregnant woman with probable prolonged SARS-CoV-2 viral shedding 221 days after diagnosis

Dai Akine; Teppei Sasahara; Ayako Koido; Kaori Abe; Kanako Abe; Akinori Oki; Noriyuki Takeyasu; Ikuta Hashimoto

doi:10.1016/j.jiac.2022.03.012

Case of a pregnant woman with probable prolonged SARS-CoV-2 viral shedding 221 days after diagnosis

J Infect Chemother. 2022 Jul;28(7):998-1000. doi: 10.1016/j.jiac.2022.03.012. Epub 2022 Mar 28.

Authors

Dai Akine¹, Teppei Sasahara², Ayako Koido³, Kaori Abe³, Kanako Abe⁴, Akinori Oki⁵, Noriyuki Takeyasu⁶, Ikuta Hashimoto⁷

Affiliations

¹ Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Ibaraki Prefectural Central Hospital, Ibaraki Cancer Center, Kasama, Ibaraki, Japan. Electronic address: m00001da@jichi.ac.jp.
² Department of Infection and Immunity, School of Medicine, Jichi Medical University, Shimotsuke, Tochigi, Japan.
³ Division of Genomic Laboratory, Department of Clinical Laboratory, Ibaraki Prefectural Central Hospital, Ibaraki Cancer Center, Kasama, Ibaraki, Japan.
⁴ Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Ibaraki Prefectural Central Hospital, Ibaraki Cancer Center, Kasama, Ibaraki, Japan.
⁵ Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Ibaraki Prefectural Central Hospital, Ibaraki Cancer Center, Kasama, Ibaraki, Japan; Ibaraki Clinical Education and Training Center, University of Tsukuba Hospital, Kasama, Ibaraki, Japan.
⁶ Division of Cardiology, Department of Medicine, Ibaraki Prefectural Central Hospital, Ibaraki Cancer Center, Kasama, Ibaraki, Japan.
⁷ Division of Respiratory Medicine, Department of Medicine, Ibaraki Prefectural Central Hospital, Ibaraki Cancer Center, Kasama, Ibaraki, Japan.

Abstract

We describe a case of probable prolonged severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Alpha(B.1.1.7) variant shedding for 221 days from the diagnosis, in a healthy 20-year-old Japanese pregnant woman with a normal delivery. To our knowledge, this is the longest duration of SARS-CoV-2 shedding reported in an immunocompetent individual to date.

Keywords: Alpha (B.1.1.7) variant; Pregnancy; SARS-CoV-2; Viral shedding.

Publication types

Case Reports

MeSH terms

Adult
COVID-19* / diagnosis
Female
Humans
Pregnancy
Pregnancy Complications, Infectious* / diagnosis
Pregnant Women
RNA, Viral
SARS-CoV-2
Virus Shedding
Young Adult

Substances

RNA, Viral

Supplementary concepts

SARS-CoV-2 variants