Huge Los Angeles County Now Testing For Virus Antibodies

Huge Los Angeles County, which has a population of 10 million, larger than 40 of the fifty states in the nation, has launched a series of antibody tests to ascertain whether people have already been infected with the coronavirus COVID-19. The general assumption is that people who test positive with antibodies from the virus are therefore immune from getting it again.

Researchers at the University of Southern California’s Price School of Public Policy have joined Los Angeles County Public Health Department to test 900 people on Friday and Saturday at six drive-thru locations. The researchers attested that the tests will continue every two weeks, as NBC News reported.

Dr. Neeraj Sood, vice dean of research at the Price School, stated that current figures totaling the number of coronavirus cases might be “the tip of the iceberg,” adding, “We’ve just been testing the sick. So we truly don’t know the true extent of the bulk of the population that might have covered. There might be many people in the population that were asymptomatic and they survived it. So having those people in the calculation will help us truly figure out how deadly this epidemic is.”

NBC News noted, “USC is also working with Stanford University and UCLA on a similar study in Santa Clara County, where 3,000 people were tested, Sood said. The findings should be published soon, he said.”

Stanford Medicine at Stanford University reported last Friday, “Working around the clock for two weeks, a large team of Stanford Medicine scientists has developed a test to detect antibodies against the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, in blood samples. In contrast to current diagnostic tests for COVID-19, which detect genetic material from the virus in respiratory secretions, this test looks for antibodies to the virus in plasma, the liquid in blood, to provide information about a person’s immune response to an infection.”

Stanford Medicine added, “Serological testing can answer many questions that cannot be addressed with the current COVID-19 diagnostic test, which uses polymerase chain reaction methods to detect viral genetic material. For instance, the novel coronavirus is thought to cause mild or asymptomatic infections in many people. Measuring antibody levels in those who have not been severely ill will help to determine how common mild infections are in the general population. The test can also be used to help show whether, and for how long, someone with antibodies is protected against reinfection.”

Meanwhile, in Minnesota the University of Minnesota and Mayo Clinic are offering clinical antibody tests; Dr. Jakub Tolar, the university’s vice president for clinical affairs and medical school dean, told the Star-Tribune that the first step for the test would be to check health care workers, asserting, “I need to figure out how to get this to them on the front line.”

The New York Times reported on Friday, “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently announced that it would begin using antibody tests to see what proportion of the population has already been infected. On Friday, the National Institutes of Health announced it would test 10,000 healthy volunteers around the country for the presence of antibodies.”