Fewer than 1 in 10 Americans showed signs of a prior coronavirus infection as of late July, suggesting that the “vast majority” of the population remains susceptible to the virus, according to a large national study published Friday in the Lancet. The researchers arrived at their findings by studying the prevalence of coronavirus antibodies, which the immune system typically generates in response to an infection, in a group of randomly selected dialysis patients across the country. Even people with coronavirus antibodies are not necessarily immune to the virus, as scientists are still trying to understand how much protection antibodies create and how long that protection might last. The finding that more than 90% of the country does not have antibodies is in line with conclusions of another study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has not yet been published, according to CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield. Taken together, the two findings indicate that despite the high level of spread of the coronavirus throughout the spring and summer, much of the U. S. has yet to be infected. That means the country likely remains far off from herd immunity, which is reached when enough of the population has developed protection against the virus so that it cannot spread efficiently.”Similar to data from other highly affected countries and regions (eg, Spain and Wuhan, China), despite the intense strain on resources and unprecedented excess mortality being experienced in the USA during the COVID-19 pandemic, fewer than 10% of US adults had formed antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 as of July, 2020,” the researchers of the new study said. The researchers were composed of a team from Stanford University and Ascend Clinical laboratory, which processes lab tests for kidney dialysis patients. They examined blood plasma samples from a randomly selected group of about 28,500 patients across 1,300 centers in 46 states. The study found that about 8% of patients had developed coronavirus antibodies. They noted that the prevalence of antibodies varied across regions of the country, with about 3.5% of patients in the West and more than 27% of patients in the Northeast showing signs of a prior infection. Eli Rosenberg, an epidemiologist at the State University of New York at Albany who was not part of the study, but has conducted similar antibody studies in New York, raised the question of whether the population of dialysis patients truly reflects that of the general population.”It’s a huge leap from dialysis to general adults,” he said, adding that because of their underlying condition they may be more susceptible to infection and that these patients might have not been able to stay at home to avoid infection. “If you’re going to a dialysis center rather than home dialysis, you don’t have the luxury of sheltering in March or April.”Regardless, he said, the study is in line with other findings that the U. S. remains far from herd immunity.
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