DISCUSSION
In this report we discussed the clinical outcome of a patient with untreated CLL and other comorbidities which are considered to increase the mortality in COVID-19 infection. In Italy, the most common comorbidities observed in COVID-19 positive deceased patients are hypertension (73.8%), and diabetes (33.9%) (Characteristics of COVID-19 patients dying in Italy. Report based on available data on March 20th, 2020, National Institute of Health,https://www.epicentro.iss.it/en/coronavirus/sars-cov-2-analysis-of-deaths). The patient was empirically treated since no recommendations about the management of lymphoid malignancies were available at that time. Actually several guidelines about the management of lymphoid malignancies have reported 5,6.
In our opinion, the reported case represents an unexpected result since there is great concern about the potential negative outcome in SARS-CoV-2 infection in patients with malignant diseases. Moreover, the leukemic CD19+/CD5+ clone, disappeared from peripheral blood during acute phase of COVID 19, recovered in convalescent phase of disease.