{"doi":"10.3389/fimmu.2022.959697","title":"Recent malaria does not substantially impact COVID-19 antibody response or rates of symptomatic illness in communities with high malaria and COVID-19 transmission in Mali, West Africa","abstract":"Malaria has been hypothesized as a factor that may have reduced the severity of the COVID-19 pandemic in sub-Saharan Africa. To evaluate the effect of recent malaria on COVID-19 we assessed a subgroup of individuals participating in a longitudinal cohort COVID-19 serosurvey that were also undergoing intensive malaria monitoring as part of antimalarial vaccine trials during the 2020 transmission season in Mali. These communities experienced a high incidence of primarily asymptomatic or mild COVID-19 during 2020 and 2021. In 1314 individuals, 711 were parasitemic during the 2020 malaria transmission season; 442 were symptomatic with clinical malaria and 269 had asymptomatic infection. Presence of parasitemia was not associated with new COVID-19 seroconversion (29.7% (211/711) vs. 30.0% (181/603), p=0.9038) or with rates of reported symptomatic seroconversion during the malaria transmission season. In the subsequent dry season, prior parasitemia was not associated with new COVID-19 seroconversion (30.2% (133/441) vs. 31.2% (108/346), p=0.7499), with symptomatic seroconversion, or with reversion from seropositive to seronegative (prior parasitemia: 36.2% (64/177) vs. no parasitemia: 30.1% (37/119), p=0.3842). After excluding participants with asymptomatic infection, clinical malaria was also not associated with COVID-19 serostatus or symptomatic seroconversion when compared to participants with no parasitemia during the monitoring period. In communities with intense seasonal malaria and a high incidence of asymptomatic or mild COVID-19, we did not demonstrate a relationship between recent malaria and subsequent response to COVID-19. Lifetime exposure, rather than recent infection, may be responsible for any effect of malaria on COVID-19 severity.","journal":"Frontiers in Immunology","year":2022,"id":267672,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":7,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9612,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":334202,"name":"Issaka Sagara","orcid":"0000-0002-8555-9983","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":928743,"name":"Halimatou Diawara","orcid":"0000-0001-5361-1532","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":495072,"name":"Mahamadoun H. Assadou","orcid":null,"position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":645890,"name":"Abdoulaye Katilé","orcid":"0000-0003-0531-3682","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":565229,"name":"Oumar Attaher","orcid":null,"position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":335640,"name":"Djibrilla Issiaka","orcid":null,"position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":448174,"name":"Santara Gaoussou","orcid":null,"position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":929274,"name":"Ibrahim H. Soumbounou","orcid":null,"position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":928744,"name":"Seydou Traoré","orcid":"0000-0003-3568-2788","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":441890,"name":"Moussa Traoré","orcid":"0000-0002-0556-0571","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":929275,"name":"Oumar M Dicko","orcid":null,"position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":772730,"name":"Sidi M. Niambele","orcid":"0000-0001-9442-1153","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":448175,"name":"Almahamoudou Mahamar","orcid":null,"position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":647005,"name":"Bourama Kamaté","orcid":null,"position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":929276,"name":"Bayaya Haidara","orcid":null,"position":15,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":647007,"name":"Kourane Sissoko","orcid":null,"position":16,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":929277,"name":"Seydou Sankare","orcid":null,"position":17,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":929278,"name":"Sadio dite Koni Diarra","orcid":null,"position":18,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":645894,"name":"Amatigué Zéguimé","orcid":"0000-0002-3158-1907","position":19,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":414017,"name":"Justin Doritchamou","orcid":"0000-0002-4589-7216","position":20,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":395417,"name":"Irfan Zaidi","orcid":"0000-0001-9161-2050","position":21,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":334203,"name":"Alassane Dicko","orcid":"0000-0003-2153-8427","position":22,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":236042,"name":"Patrick E. 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