SARS-CoV-2 proteome: is the SPIKE protein not an issue for a hospitalized patient?
It is always a problem. "The virus" is not a single particle that only needs to enter a single cell, a single time. It is a population of millions of viral particles, that infect millions of cells. So, as long as there are more cells to infect, the viral population still needs a mechanism to enter the cell (i.e. it still needs all the proteins needed to function).