Scientists are trying to track down an Ohio resident they believe is the longest-lived Covid patient ever, DailyMail.com can reveal.
The patient – believed to live in the Columbus area – carries a highly mutated version of the virus that is “nothing different” than experts have seen.
The virus has been detected through sewage samples and has been traced back to early 2021. It is picked up repeatedly in an area 40 miles away, indicating that one person is carrying it and expelling it through their feces.
Dr. Marc Johnson, a microbiologist at the University of Missouri, warned that the mutations the strain has would be serious enough to make it a “variant of concern” if it were to circulate among the population.
The Covid strain of man has evolved significantly differently from existing strains such as the Omicron and Delta variants familiar to the populace. Pictured: A viral ‘boom’ showing how different versions of Covid have evolved. Clustered in the center (blue arrow) are known variants that are distributed around the world. Within these strains there are thousands if not millions of mutations that set them apart. However, the strain of the unknown Ohio individual (red line) mutated completely separately. The viral composition is very different from other versions of the virus, and the evolutionary chain is linear – without thousands of branches. This indicates that the tribe only circulates in one individual.
A person in Ohio has been infected with Covid for more than two years. Researchers found they commute regularly from the small town of Washington Court House, about 40 miles northeast of Columbus, Ohio. They probably live in Washington and work or go to school in Columbus
Dr. Johnson believes the tension is caused by the same person who regularly commutes between Columbus and Washington Court House.
The scientist isn’t sure if the person is contagious or how they managed to stay infected for so long.
Patients who contain viruses for an exceptionally long time often have a weakened immune system, which means their bodies have trouble clearing the virus. Many scientists believe that the Alpha, Delta, and Omicron variants all originated this way.
Dr. However, Johnson is confident that the patient is healthy and able to travel for work or school, but cannot rule out a chronically ill person commuting for hospital care. His team also cannot say with certainty that it concerns one patient.
The Missouri team has analyzed Covid samples from sewage in the US looking for ‘cryptic’ Covid strains – new variants of the virus that have emerged with unknown origins.
The technique was used as an aid during the pandemic. Because the virus appears in the stool before anyone develops symptoms, sewage data days in advance could help detect where outbreaks would occur.
‘We reverse analyse [wastewater] to see if there’s anything in there that doesn’t match any lineage,” Dr. Johnson to DailyMail.com.
“Very early on there was this [sample] that was unlike anything we had seen,” he continued.
Late last year, his team began scanning wastewater data from Ohio.
He found the virus in Columbus, the state’s largest city of nearly 1 million people, and in Washington Court House, a small city of just 15,000 in the Southwest.
As far as he knows, this same lineage has not been found anywhere else. This particular pattern likely means the person lives in Washington Court House and commutes to Columbus.
It could be for work, but the patient could also be a student, as Columbus is home to Ohio State University – which has over 66,000 students.
It’s unclear how the person carried the virus for so long, but it’s likely the virus mutated in him to cause minor complications.
The longest confirmed Covid case was recorded by British doctors in April last year, when they confirmed a patient had been infected for 505 days – almost a year and a half.
Overall, there are probably only a few thousand people who meet these guidelines, a relatively small group that should be searched.
This strain has mutated into this individual over time. It has mutated to such an extent that it probably has features very different from any extant species – meaning it poses a danger if it spreads.
“If this were in circulation, it would immediately be declared a variant of concern,” Dr Johnson said.
However, the virus has probably mutated in this person in such a way that it is not suitable for spreading.
Instead, the virus has managed to adapt itself in such a way that it can live in its host for long periods of time while remaining relatively undetected.
It is likely a version of the Alpha or Wuhan strain that has mutated significantly in its body.
The virus has managed to hide in the person’s body to multiply infinitely without the immune system targeting it.
This can happen when the virus reaches “immuno-privileged sites” in the body, where the immune system is unlikely to target. This may include the eyes, brain, and fertility organs such as the testes.
But while unlikely, it could be possible for the virus to acquire a few mutations needed to spread through the population.
The patient is also likely to be asymptomatic or may be experiencing symptoms similar to an intestinal disorder such as Chron’s disease – with patients experiencing cramping and diarrhea.
“Chances are they don’t know they’ve been affected,” he continued.
Dr. Johnson hopes to find this patient in order to receive medical attention, as well as collect samples that he can use to learn more about the cryptic tribe.
His team has been able to track down holders of cryptic Covid lineages in the past.
In the spring of 2022, Dr. Johnson found a cryptic species in Wisconsin. The affected person lost their viral load at an exorbitant rate.
His team tested water in manholes in the area and managed to pinpoint where the cargo came from.
At the end of the summer of 2022, they linked the species to a toilet in a specific building, where many people worked who came to work every day. One of those employees carries the cryptic tension, Dr. Johnson believes.
The company has agreed to allow Dr. Johnson to collect stool samples from some employees to determine who is carrying the strain.
The typical case of Covid only lasts a few days – and the maximum time someone should be sick is two weeks.
However, many people have experienced long-lasting symptoms after a Covid infection – some were diagnosed with the mysterious condition ‘lung Covid’.
Dr. Johnson fears that in some of these cases, a person will continue to feel these symptoms because they are really just suffering from an ongoing infection.
