Prolonged viral shedding and new mutations of COVID-19 could complicate the control of the pandemic

The studies of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have mainly focused on epidemiological and clinical features of patients, but transmission dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 virus after patients have recovered is still poorly understood. Here we report a case with prolonged viral shedding of COVID-19 in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. This patient started to show myalgia and malaise in Wuhan, and the onset of the fever was on days 7–14 of the illness. All clinical and radiological results returned to normal after day 26, however, viral shedding was still evident 14 days later. Sequence analysis of the genome of the Taiwanese SARS-CoV-2 isolate from this patient reveals new mutations in viral replicase and ORF3a, indicating that COVID-19 evolves very quickly. Prolonged viral shedding and new mutations in the viral genome could potentially complicate the control of the COVID-19 pandemic.