Loading...
Please wait, while we are loading the content...
Infectivity of deceased COVID-19 patients.
| Content Provider | Europe PMC |
|---|---|
| Author | Plenzig, Stefanie Bojkova, D. Held, H. Berger, A. Holz, F. Cinatl, J. Gradhand, E. Kettner, M. Pfeiffer, A. Verhoff, M. A. Ciesek, S. |
| Abstract | The duration of infectivity of SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) in living patients has been demarcated. In contrast, a possible SARS-CoV-2 infectivity of corpses and subsequently its duration under post mortem circumstances remain to be elucidated. The aim of this study was to investigate the infectivity and its duration of deceased COVID-19 (coronavirus disease) patients. Four SARS-CoV-2 infected deceased patients were subjected to medicolegal autopsy. Post mortem intervals (PMI) of 1, 4, 9 and 17 days, respectively, were documented. During autopsy, swabs and organ samples were taken and examined by RT-qPCR (real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction) for the detection of SARS-CoV-2 ribonucleic acid (RNA). Determination of infectivity was performed by means of virus isolation in cell culture. In two cases, virus isolation was successful for swabs and tissue samples of the respiratory tract (PMI 4 and 17 days). The two infectious cases showed a shorter duration of COVID-19 until death than the two non-infectious cases (2 and 11 days, respectively, compared to > 19 days), which correlates with studies of living patients, in which infectivity could be narrowed to about 6 days before to 12 days after symptom onset. Most notably, infectivity was still present in one of the COVID-19 corpses after a post-mortem interval of 17 days and despite already visible signs of decomposition. To prevent SARS-CoV-2 infections in all professional groups involved in the handling and examination of COVID-19 corpses, adequate personal safety standards (reducing or avoiding aerosol formation and wearing FFP3 [filtering face piece class 3] masks) have to be enforced for routine procedures. |
| Related Links | https://europepmc.org/backend/ptpmcrender.fcgi?accid=PMC7932833&blobtype=pdf |
| ISSN | 09379827 |
| Journal | International Journal of Legal Medicine [Int J Legal Med] |
| Volume Number | 135 |
| DOI | 10.1007/s00414-021-02546-7 |
| PubMed Central reference number | PMC7932833 |
| Issue Number | 5 |
| PubMed reference number | 33665704 |
| e-ISSN | 14371596 |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Springer Berlin Heidelberg |
| Publisher Date | 2021-03-05 |
| Publisher Place | Berlin/Heidelberg |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Rights License | Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. © The Author(s) 2021 |
| Subject Keyword | SARS-CoV-2 Autopsy Post mortem examination Pathology Forensic medicine |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
| Subject | Pathology and Forensic Medicine |
