South Korean officials on Thursday said that 141 people have re-tested positive for COVID-19, raising the number from earlier this week.
Kim Woo-joo, an infectious diseases expert at Korea University Hospital, stated that experts are concerned that the virus may have mutated and caused the relapse.
“About one fifth of them are healthy people with a good immune system but they still tested positive for the virus after they were initially diagnosed as cured,” Kim said. “Researchers are testing blood samples to determine whether patients are reinfected because they have problems with their own immunity system or the virus has mutated somehow to circumvent the bodily defence system.”
And Kwon said that South Korea’s government is studying cultivated samples from the 141 patients to see if they are contagious. It will take about two weeks.