The risk of death, hospitalization and serious health issues from COVID-19 jumps significantly with reinfection compared with a first bout with the virus, regardless of vaccination status, a study published on Thursday suggests.

¡°Reinfection with COVID-19 increases the risk of both acute outcomes and long COVID,¡± said Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. ¡°This was evident in unvaccinated, vaccinated and boosted people.¡±

The findings were drawn from U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) data collected from March 1, 2020 through April 6, 2022 on 443,588 patients with one SARS-CoV-2 infection, 40,947 with two or more infections, and 5.3 million noninfected individuals. Most of the study subjects were male.