WHO issues warning on coronavirus testing: There's no evidence antibody tests show immunity

[bronxiteforever]

Source: CNBC

PUBLISHED FRI, APR 17 20201:38 PM EDT
By Berkeley Lovelace Jr. & William Feuer

The World Health Organization issued a warning Friday about coronavirus testing, saying there’s no evidence serological tests can show whether a person has immunity or not at risk of becoming reinfected.

“These antibody tests will be able to measure that level of serology presence, that level of antibodies, but that does not mean that somebody with antibodies” are immune, Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, head of WHO’s emerging diseases and zoonosis unit, told reporters during a press conference at the agency’s headquarters in Geneva.

So-called serological, or antibody, tests indicate whether a person has had Covid-19 in the past and was either asymptomatic or recovered.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/17/who-issues-warning-on-coronavirus-testing-theres-no-evidence-antibody-tests-show-immunity.html

[Voltaire2]

1. No problem: kill the messenger.

problem solved.

[Botany]

2. And the idea that people with C-19 antibodies in their blood can now go back to work ...

... is the backbone of Trump & Fox News' time to open things back up meme.

[stopdiggin]

18. yes, the "passport" theory

featured in many restart discussions.

[Botany]

21. I really hope that "they" can find people who have had C-19, recovered, and have the antibodies

... that will give lifetime immunity to the disease but for now it is just more of Trump's hydroxycholoquine
"snake oil" and believe in that theory and then opening society back up MIGHT lead to another big spike
in the disease.

[Thekaspervote]

3. Not debunking the WHO, but will be anxious to hear the rest of that story

There’s so much unknown about this virus, but as a medical professional it sounds like there’s more to the story

[bronxiteforever]

5. I think the answer is in the statement

“No evidence”. They are waiting for evidence and therefore unable to say. This is my guess but it is only a guess. Unfortunately, we are way way behind the data collection component.

[localroger]

11. Actually, kind of the other way around

Normally, presence of antibodies would support an assumption of immunity. But there is some evidence, so far limited, that previously infected people in China (not people who tested positive for antibodies but who actually had the disease, tested positive for the virus, and recovered) have been re-infected. This casts doubt on the entire theory that antibodies can protect you long-term, which casts doubt both on the reliability of the antibody test to demonstrate immunity and on the very possibility of ever developing a vaccine. They probably want to be absolutely sure about what is going on with those cases before recommending policy.

[bronxiteforever]

12. I posted this article on the reinfection issue

I thought it was an excellent presentation of the state of the science on this issue.

Poor immunity or mutations? South Korea investigates 'shrewd' coronavirus as reinfections creep up

South China Morning Post
This week in Asia
By John Power
Published: 5:31pm, 16 Apr, 2020

In late February, South Korean health officials on the front lines of the battle against the novel coronavirus noticed a strange phenomenon. After contracting and recovering from the virus, a patient tested positive for a second time. Within weeks, the number of patients testing positive twice rose steadily and the trend became clear.

By Thursday, at least 141 people in South Korea had retested positive for the virus officially called SARS-CoV-2, according to the Korea Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, most of them in Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province, the original centre of the country’s outbreak. Fifty-five of the cases were people in their 20s or 30s.

... Although it is possible, many experts are sceptical about whether the trend represents cases of actual reinfection – which would raise serious doubts about the ability to develop a vaccine – based on existing knowledge of other coronaviruses, which people are generally immune to for at least a year after infection.

... Experts widely agree it is too early to draw firm conclusions about the situation in South Korea. At the same time, many anticipate that the wealth of data emerging from the country’s mass testing will include answers to this and other questions about the virus in time. “South Korea has done an excellent job with epidemiologic surveillance,” said Howard Forman, a professor of public health policy at Yale School of Management in the US. “I am counting on them to clarify this soon.”

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/health-environment/article/3080251/poor-immunity-or-mutations-south-korea-investigates

[localroger]

13. Thanks, much clearer info than I had nt

[bronxiteforever]

14. I was vague in my previous post.

We don’t know but man I really hope one gets immunity.

[localroger]

26. Yeah, right, I have a rather personal reason for hoping so

I am about 95% sure I was exposed and survived the infection. Can't be sure, because you couldn't get a test in mid March unless you were half-dead with fever, but I was exposed to one of the first 100 cases in Louisiana to test positive. About a week after my last likely exposure I woke up with terrible pain in my hips. I had to figure out new ways of putting on and tying my shoes and getting in and out of the car. At the time I chalked it up to chapter 56 of Getting Old but then the coworker who tested positive came back, having survived, and I started putting the timeline together and I did a search and found out that in Wuhan, where they tested everybody, about 15% of those who tested positive reported joint pain as their only symptom. My hip pains faded out in the third week and went away. It is not entirely certain that I had CV-19 but if it was anything else it was a hell of a coincidence. So I damn well hope it confers immunity.

[bronxiteforever]

27. I hope so too! Stay healthy friend!

[Chemisse]

37. Good article.

It will be interesting to see what this turns out to be reinfection. Hopefully not reinfection!

[Igel]

9. Yes.

There are different kinds of antibodies.

Some suppress infection. They block insertion of the genetic material in the cell, they block some other function that's necessary for replication. They bind at a site that disables or seriously impedes the virus.

Some indicate infection and that's all. They bind to the virus, but they bind in a way that doesn't affect the ability of the virus to replicate. They're nice for showing if you were exposed, but they don't offer protection, or at least not much. (I mean, change the virus' mass you're going to change its kinetics.)


Cross those categories with antibody longevity. If you get a certain kind of cold, you're immune to it. You can associate with those shedding that virus all you want. The same season. A couple of years later you've lost your immunity and can catch the same virus all over again. For some such viruses there are booster vaccinations if it's a particularly nasty bug. For colds, nah.

Other immunities last pretty much for life. (Unless something like measles comes along and resets the immune system. Bad measles.)


In some cases it seems that severity of the immune response while sick matters. With vaccinations, that might mean two doses for immunity. Otherwise, if you get off with sniffles from an actual infection you may have no detectable antibodies. If you get a severe case you may be protected essentially for life. In between is in between.


The way you test this is by infecting people after they've been exposed, and at different time intervals. The problem with this is that the time intervals haven't been able to pass yet, the virus is too new as a human infection. Oh, and the little problem that it can be a severe illness, so human research protocol boards aren't likely to okay such experiments.

[Botany]

17. I have read that some people with the C-19 antibodies might not have long term immunity but...

... instead might have temporary or transitory immunity are they the same thing?

[stopdiggin]

20. Thanks. Very informative.

And I even understood the bulk of it!

[Thekaspervote]

31. Thx...was thinking along the same lines. You laid it out so well

[bucolic_frolic]

4. We are at a tipping point

Either reopening the economy creates wave 2 and fatalities become 10 fold or more and they cover it up with inadequate statistics and lies, or reopening the economy creates wave 2 and fatalities become 10 fold or more and they tell us the truth. How could they hope to cover up evidence or even anecdotal evidence of so many deaths? Already it's a budding avalanche.

[muriel_volestrangler]

6. I'd hope everyone told they have antibodies is told they MUST report any suspicion of more symptoms

so that they can then get a new antigen test (and maybe another antibody one). That would be pretty much the whole point of doing antibody tests at this point.

[uppityperson]

7. well that sucks majorly.

[LovingA2andMI]

8. This is why the World Health Organization was "Defunded"

Think about it. HE KNEW THIS WAS COMING.

[bronxiteforever]

10. Well that is brilliant read of Orange Nero

I hope you are wrong though and they are just waiting for evidence. Your point is more in line with the evil creep though

[LovingA2andMI]

15. The President receives information prior to the public

This report is literally two days from Trump defunding WHO.

[bronxiteforever]

16. Very good point.

[JudyM]

30. Whoa.

So that’s the likely “oranges” of his newest aggression against WHO.

[LovingA2andMI]

42. Yep...

n/t

[BlueIdaho]

19. Science must lead us...

We know next to nothing about how this virus operates. Making sloppy assumptions will get people killed. We need to keep our powder dry until we have conclusive proof on antibody testing.

[stopdiggin]

22. quite true. but in this case what we know ..

keeps shifting on us. If in fact recovery does not impart immunity (or the ability to infect) .. then that is very different from anything we've seen before .. and quite different from current understanding, methods and models. (And a sea change as far as game changer in treatment and epidemiology.)

(note -- Article does not say this is true. Just can't be sure.)

[BlueIdaho]

24. Yes... we just aren't there yet.

No sense guessing x we have to wait for scientific results. That’s a PIA for me personally because I’m not a real patient guy - but patient we must be. Eventually science will have the answers. Until the. We need to keep the hotheads in check.

Take care!

[Warpy]

23. Of course they don't. That's true for all diseases

Antibodies show that someone has been exposed to a disease and that the immune system has mounted a defense. Post illness, it can indicate immunity, or at least partial immunity to similar strains of the same bug.

A handful of people have cleared the virus and tested positive a second time We don't know if they are ill a second time or if this is a chronic, relapsing illness. We don't know if the virus mutations are happening fast enough that people are simply catching a different strain (unlikely). So far, this hasn't been widely reported, so it might be only a few individuals who fail to clear the virus completely--it is a gut virus in other species and could likely remain there for months, laying low and waiting for poor or absent handwashing to spread it, occasionally back to the host.

These are all questions it will take time and a large enough pool of survivors to answer.

[Thekaspervote]

32. Researchers are finding that the co-sars2 virus is not mutating significantly

One small piece of good news

https://www.statnews.com/pharmalot/2020/03/25/coronavirus-covid19-trump-india-hydroxychloroquine/

Many many links besides this one

[Warpy]

35. Apparently it's happened barely fast enough

to determine whether it came from Asia or through Europe, not that it matters a hell of a lot.

There is other good news, one antiviral drug has shown some promise and one of the biologics has been used to mitigate cytokine storm with some success. Progress is being made, but it will be a slow process of collecting data, examining adverse effects, and publishing results. There is light at the end of the tunnel, but it's dim and far away at this point.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

25. If recovering from this disease does not confer immunity,

then this is a unique virus. I don't know of any other viral disease that, once you've had it, you're immune, usually for the rest of your life.

[NickB79]

28. This was documented in SARS and MERS patients previously

Also members of the coronavirus. Survivors typically started seeing immunity wane after 2 years.

And with common cold viruses, immunity wanes within a year.

https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20200414/will-coronavirus-exposure-mean-lasting-immunity

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

34. I'm under the impression that the reason we tend to get colds

so often is that there hundreds, maybe thousands of cold viruses out there, and each and every cold we get is because we've been exposed to a new cold virus. Guess I was wrong about that. Except how do you explain that the older I get, the fewer colds I get? I'm now 71 and I last had a cold a couple of years ago. The one before was probably three years earlier.

[Warpy]

36. It would be unique among coronaviruses, also NT

[Kashkakat v.2.0]

29. IF ANTIBODIES dont result in immunity, does this mean vaccine wont work? nt

[Thekaspervote]

33. I believe it means repeated vaccines until such a time the virus has no place left to go

Just as the 1918 flu which this virus has many things in common with, researchers found in time it became much less dangerous to humans

[roamer65]

41. Survivors carried the weaker strains onward.

Natural selection at work.

[greenjar_01]

38. No antibody tests show anything other than serology presence

This is truly a derp interpretation of a rather standard disclaimer.

[roamer65]

39. Inject infected people with the correct type of plasma from recovered ones.

You will know pretty damn soon if it works or not.

[w0nderer]

40. k & r n/t