The University of Oxford said on Monday it has started a trial in which people who have already had COVID-19 are intentionally reinfected.
The carefully controlled study will look at the type of immune response elicited by the volunteers.
The scientists will know “exactly when the second infection occurs, and exactly how much virus they have,” Helen McShane, a professor of vaccinology, said in a statement.
She said the study “could help us design tests that can accurately predict whether people are protected” after a previous infection.
Anyone who shows symptoms will receive the Regeneron antibody treatment used to treat COVID-19 patients.
The University of Oxford’s first-of-a-kind tests are funded by the Wellcome Trust.
At the start of the trial, up to 64 fit and healthy volunteers aged 18 to 30 will be intentionally reinfected with the original Wuhan strain.
They will be quarantined for at least 17 days in a special hospital suite, with lung and heart scans. They then have follow-up appointments and are followed for a year.
“This study has the potential to transform our understanding by providing high-quality data,” said Shobana Balasingam, senior research advisor on vaccines at Wellcome.
The first phase of the trial looks at the minimum dose at which the virus can replicate without symptoms in about 50 percent of the volunteers.
In the second phase, a different group of volunteers will all receive this established minimum dose.
The trial comes because a hospital in London isolated a group of healthy volunteers while exposed to the virus, in a world first.
This started in March and is being carried out in collaboration between Imperial College London and the company hVIVO at the Royal London Hospital.
Those infected in a controlled manner are monitored to see how their disease is progressing and how drugs and vaccines can work against it.
© Agence France-Presse