Do symptom presentation or viral load correlate with chance of reinfection? Some might be asking this considering Omicron.
According to data from the ONS, it kind of does, but the difference is nowhere as dramatic as you might be led to believe: the asymptomatic have a 22% higher chance of reinfection compared to the symptomatic, and most viral loads are within 10% of the average reinfection risk. Only those with very low viral loads (Ct above 30 in a PCR test ) have a meaningfully higher chance of reinfection (13% to 61% higher than the average risk).
So while Omicron might be somewhat less immunogenic overall due to prefering closed RBD loops, like the endemic coronaviruses, it should not be so due to its intrinsic mildness. The odd BA.2 reinfection should be possible since it has six different mutations in the RBD compared to BA.1, though rare since these are mostly at minor epitopes.
