Longitudinal Characteristics of T Cell Responses in Asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 Infection.

SARS-CoV-2 causes a spectrum of illness, ranging from an asymptomatic state to life-threatening multi-organ failure, and imposes a high socioeconomic burden on its sufferers and on society (Chen et al. 2020; Pan et al. 2020). Asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection, confirmed by assay with quantitative real-time reverse transcription PCR (qRT-PCR), presented neither clinical symptom nor radiographic abnormality (Pan et al. 2020). While T cell responses are crucial for viral control, viral infection also induces significant count decrease and function impairment of T cells (Chen et al. 2020; Qin et al. 2020). Despite high rate of SARS-CoV-2 asymptomatic infections (Black et al. 2020), T cell responses of this population are still largely unknown. Here, we reported the kinetics of CD4+ and CD8+ T cell responses in an asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infected case.