Low prevalence and disease severity of COVID‐19 in post‐liver transplant recipients—A single centre experience

Abstract

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) caused by a novel coronavirus called severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus‐2 (SARS‐CoV‐2) is driving a present day global pandemic. Immunosuppressed patients are regarded as a high risk cohort. The following is a short report on COVID‐19 in liver transplant recipients (n=5) from a high volume UK liver transplant unit with a large follow up cohort (n=4500). Based on this limited data, liver transplant recipients appear to have a low incidence of COVID‐19, with less severe symptoms than expected, when compared to the general population and other solid organ recipients. This possibly could be related to self‐isolation adherence and/or the “ideal” level of immunosuppression that favourably modulates the immune response to COVID‐19.