Tracking the next pandemic: Avian Flu Talk |
COVID immunity higher than thought study finds |
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AI
Adviser Group Joined: January 21 2020 Status: Offline Points: 8850 |
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Posted: July 01 2020 at 10:32pm |
Globally, more than 10 million people have been infected with the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Of these, at least 5.39 million have recovered, but the question of long-lasting immunity and protection from being infected again remains unclear. Now, a team of researchers at the Karolinska Institutet and Karolinska University Hospital in Sweden has found that the number of people immune to COVID-10 may be higher than previously thought, and that antibody testing may no longer be the appropriate tool to trace it. T-cell mediated immunityPublic immunity to the novel coronavirus, which causes the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), could be higher than antibody tests suggest. This also means that people who have not tested positive for antibodies can still show a T-cell mediated immunity to the coronavirus. To arrive at their findings, the team conducted immunological analyses of samples from more than 200 individuals, a majority of whom had only mild or no symptoms of the viral infection. They included some patients admitted to the Karolinska University Hospital. Those who donated blood during the 2020 and 2019 periods were also included as the control group. The team observed that those who had a positive COVID-19 test are not just the ones who showed T-cell immunity but also their exposed family members who were asymptomatic (had no symptoms). Further, about 30 percent of blood donors who donated blood in May 2020 had COVID-19 specific T cells, showing that the rate is way higher than previous antibody tests have shown.
People may have established an antibody response, but either it had faded or was not detectable in tests. The study results indicate that public immunity to SARS-CoV-2 infection is potentially higher than antibody tests have shown. However, the team noted that T-cell analyses are more complex and harder to perform. They are conducted in specialized laboratories. |
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EdwinSm,
Moderator Joined: April 03 2013 Status: Offline Points: 24065 |
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A ray of good news. But only 200 people were tested, so there should be larger scale studies to show if this would be a better test and truer indicator of what is happening "behind the scenes". |
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