The Kinetics of Humoral Response and its Relationship with the Disease Severity in COVID-19

Abstract Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has caused global pandemic. Here we profiled the humoral response against SARS-CoV-2 by measuring immunoglobulin (Ig) A, IgM and IgG against nucleocapsid, spike proteins and IgM, IgG antibodies against receptor-binding domain (RBD) of the spike protein along with total neutralizing antibodies. We tested 279 plasma samples collected from 176 COVID-19 patients. We demonstrate more severe cases have a late onset in the humoral response compared to mild/moderate infections. All the antibody titers continue to rise in patients with COVID-19 over the disease course. However, these levels are mostly unrelated to the disease severity. The appearance time and titers of neutralizing antibodies showed significant positive correlation to the antibodies against spike protein. Our results suggest late onset of antibody response as a risk factor for disease severity, however there is a limited role of antibody titers in predicting disease severity of COVID-19.