Hello friends and welcome back to my blog! As we all know by now, basically the whole country is shut down and under quarantine due to the coronavirus. Personally, I don’t have faith that any of this will be over soon, but there are still some sparks of hope arising every now and then. For example, there are antibody tests currently being studied to determine if someone who has already been infected with the virus can be considered immune and can continue on with their daily lives. This antibody test is a blood test that can determine whether someone has ever been infected with the coronavirus at some point. However, according to the New York Times, “they are not perfect, and there have been problems with their accuracy,” so studies are still being conducted.
How Is The Test Read?
The test being conducted to determine this is called a serology test, looking for signs of an immune response. When the body encounters a virus, the first type of antibody to appear is the immunoglobulin M, or IgM, and its levels spike within a few days of infection. However, IgMs cannot find an infection alone so a second antibody called immunoglobulin G, or IgG, helps to recognize the specific virus. If there are only IgM antibodies present, the virus is current or has just passed in the body, if there both IgM and IgG antibodies present, there is still an infection going on but it could be towards the end of its run. As IgG levels rise in the blood, the IgM levels will drop indicating that the infection is not new in the body. If IgG antibodies are primarily present, this could indicate that the person has either had the infection before, or they have a latent infection. Therefore, if a person is IgG positive, they could still possibly infect other people but they wouldn’t be the most contagious person as they could be getting over the infection.
Test Findings
According to ABC News, there was a study conducted out of Shanghai that looked at blood samples of 175 patients who had recovered from mild Covid-19. This study didn’t go through a scientific peer review, but their results were interesting. They found that about a third of people developed relatively low antibodies, while in others, no antibodies could be detected. The study also found that “elderly patients were most likely to induce higher concentrations of the antibodies than younger patients.” This could mean that the lack of antibodies produced in younger patients could possibly mean a lack of immunity to the virus. Despite this, these antibody tests will be effective in determining how widely the virus has spread in the population and will help scientists better estimate the death rate of Covid-19.
These new tests being administered alleviate some of the stress and anxiety I have about proceedings of this virus, but they still haven’t cleared the air for me. Hopefully scientists will be able to crack down to the nitty-gritty of the serotypes and will know how to proceed with Covid-19 infections. All of this craziness going on in the world has done nothing but make everything seem so negative.
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