Anyone had Covid-19 antibody testing yet?
What was the impetus for getting the tests? Did they get them through work, on their own? Did one of them likely get it from another? (E.g. were they in the same residence?)
they needed to be around another family member who is/was very high risk and wanted to be safe before they did that.
Thanks. Contemplating testing here for similar reasons (even with caveat that it only supplies some level of reassurance).
Did they get a PCR test after testing positive for antibodies? Because you start building antibodies while still infected so they could have definitely been contagious still. Hope they didn't put the high risk relative in harm's way.
If my Covid PCR test comes back positive (I should know in the next couple of days), I will get it done after I am cleared of the virus. My doctor has started offering them - $100, not covered by insurance.
And they’re not the tests made in China.
Speaking of which, remember when “Made in China” was synonymous with “cheap junk?” Those days may be returning, at least for some things.
Did that ever change? I thought we all just accepted the WalMartization of society, and decided to live with lots of cheap junk.
Speaking of which, remember when “Made in China” was synonymous with “cheap junk?”
i remember when that was said about Japan.
My wife was going to get one last week, but decided against it due to the inaccurate results being reported. We're going to wait for a more reliable test.
Although it's sort of pointless since we don't understand what a positive test means regarding immunity from infection or reinfection.
Although it's sort of pointless since we don't understand what a positive test means regarding immunity from infection or reinfection.
This is true, for now. Still, it would be good to know if you've had Covid-19 (within the precision of the test, anyway). Some of the tests can measure your IgG and IgM levels, not just detect their presence, so it provides at least a window into how robust your body's response was to the infection.
Here's something from just yesterday about a new antibody test being given emergency approval.
According to this and a couple other news reports I've seen, it's been shown to have a significantly higher than 99% accuracy rate, much better than any other tests currently being used.
I'm a family med doc and bought some of those cheapo tests but stopped doing them about 2 weeks after I got them because I don't trust the results.
I think lab tests will have value and the as mentioned here, the Roche tests look good. The abbott tests are also supposed to be very good.
We've had three patients who either had neg covid swabs or weren't swabbed come back with positive IgG tests.
I've heard that the PCR tests can also return false negatives, not so much because the test itself is faulty, but because the swab didn't pick up virus particles in the nostrils. My physician and a close friend who is a MD both gave me that warning.
However, judging from the skill of the tech jamming the cotton-tipped cattle prod up my nose on Friday, I can say for certain that if there were virus particles anywhere in my ZIP code, she found them.
Most experts estimate that only about 2/3 of true positive cases are being picked up but the PCR tests. Been a common thing for people to show at the hospital with symtoms, test negative, sometimes multiple times and then test positive a day or two later.
Also people testing negative after an infection, being cleared as recovered and then testing positive again are mostly likely false negatives.
And yes, it's mostly due to not enough particles being picked up by the swab.
There was a question whether these tests detected only covid-19 Antibodies or cross reacted with antibodies from other coronavirus’. Has this been resolved?
An excellent question. I think when it comes to most COVID-19 questions regarding treatments, cures, vaccines, effectiveness of preventative measures, and guidelines in general, the research and studies done thus far have led to the conclusion that we can now safely say "WHO THE FUCK KNOWS?!".
This is probably the most accurate summation of where we are right now. I'll state this a little more verbosely in a post tonight or tomorrow, hopefully.
Been patiently waiting for post #2 the past several days. Glad it's coming out soon!
I can get you a test.
Just email me a picture of your eyeball - it is new technology, please don't ask, very technical - and I'll get you back a positive/negative quickly.
Low cost too, only $20.
What if we're allergic to Retinax 5?
Too early for the vast majority of people to get tested for antibodies. Prevalence simply isn't high enough in most places to be useful.
For example, if 2% of the population has had COVID19 and the test is 90% specific, if you tested positive it's more likely it was a false positive than a true positive.
I get tested in a week, but I'm a health care worker in NYC. Won't really change what I do. Test isn't good enough to be my and other's lives.
On an individual basis, shouldn't the chance of a false positive be the same either way? My understanding of antibody tests is that they are most useful to understand community immunity, not a single person.
On an individual basis, shouldn't the chance of a false positive be the same either way?
It's not a question of the likelihood of a false positive; it's a question of interpreting that. If a test has a 90% specificity, then one out of every 10 negative people will test positive. But that doesn't tell you anything unless you also know the prevalence in the population. If the true positive rate is 1%, then there are approximately 10 false positives for every true positive. That makes the test results relatively worthless.
My understanding of antibody tests is that they are most useful to understand community immunity, not a single person.
A sufficiently accurate antibody test can absolutely be used to make determinations about a single individual. However, since we don't know whether or not COVID antibodies confer immunity, I'm not yet sure of the value of these tests. If it turns out that you can catch it multiple times, there may not be any point in testing anybody.
Thanks for the additional insights, they are really helpful.
Regarding test specificity, the consequences for the serological studies are obvious, considering that the prevalence being is currently something like 3% (or less) in most places - NY notwithstanding.
It would seem that adding additional data into an analysis - like total ILI rates and the fraction that is assumed/verified to be Covid-19, for instance - would help narrow the uncertainty.
Agree there is no point in testing individuals since it likely doesn't mean you have immunity for long. But the OP is posing the question out of curiosity as it becomes more and more common for people to pay out of pocket to get tests out of curiosity.
And to ninja's question whom you were responding to, I think he's asking about individual results in the absence of knowing the prevalence in the population, since we don't know the prevalence. I think if the prevalence itself were a random variable uniformly distributed from 0-100%, the test specificity would essentially be the accuracy of the test.
But even though we don't know the true prevalence, we know even the highest estimates are 20-25% in some places but more like <5% in most places.
So if one were to assume the prevalence is 10% where one lives, getting a 90% specific test (I'm going with your definition that it correctly hits on all positives but returns a false positive 10% of the time), then a positive result means it's a little over 50/50 to actually be positive for the individual in question.
I took the test in Illinois and I did not have Antibodies. The test was a quick and easy blood test, I am not sure if insurance covers it but those test are usually less then 200 dollars so I was not that concerned about the price.
I personally predict that the positive rate will be less then what's actually out in general society. Most people at my test site where in low exposure jobs (I am an accountant and when I was there we had two fire fighter, a sales rep, and a scientist) and since there are limited location to get the test and the state is not cover the cost wealthy people who work in low exposure jobs will most likely make up the overwhelming majority of people tested.
There is no such thing as a "positive" rate as you describe. You're taking an elective test for your information/curiosity only. The overall rates from what you're doing won't be published.
But one could make the argument that elective tests could produce a higher than population positive rate because people who experienced symptoms in the past couple months are probably more likely to be curious and elect to have the test done.
I took the antibody test last week from Michigan Urgent Care. Read an article a couple weeks back that said they were among the first in Michigan with a test for anyone (not just first responders, people with work needs to get it, etc.) Had to call a few days in a row to check if they had enough as they definitely run out quickly. Quick prick to the finger and had results back in about 15mins once I finally got in. $35 out of pocket.
I was positive for both IgG and IgM antibodies. I had all of the symptoms about 6-7 weeks ago and called the Beaumont hotline daily while I had them but was never tested as they simply didn't have enough and I'm in my 20s with no underlying health conditions.
I'm healthy again and can work from home pretty easily, but my live-in girlfriend works at a clinic so we've been extra cautious. She never got sick and tested negative, FWIW.
Interesting. How long were you sick?
Probably 11-12 days total. First week felt like a bad flu, second was when the difficulty breathing really came up...
FDA says that (now!) it will exercise oversight of the antibody tests. FDA steps up scrutiny of coronavirus antibody tests to ensure accuracy
My family of 4 all got the test on April 14, and all of us tested negative. There was a specific reason we got tested, which I will share below, but we are also very skeptical of the negative result. And, I should point out, the physician that tested us negative x4 stopped administering the tests less than a week after. A remarkably low percentage of her tests were coming back positive. Something didn't add up.
We have a special needs son (7 years old) that was gravely ill with respiratory problems in December and was hospitalized in the PICU in mid-December. He stayed 6 days and bounced back. He had 2 other short stays at the children's hospital January 2 and February 1. Then our other sign (9), otherwise healthy with no special needs, was in bed for 4 days over his Christmas break.
We can't be convinced by anyone that Covid didn't work its way through our household back in December. My wife and I are fit people in our 40s and had no symptoms of it.
Do you live in China? Because my friend, unless you do, this did not work its way through your house in mid-December. There are plenty of other bugs that could have triggered these symptoms (also you and your wife would have been far more likely to be hit harder than your kids if it was Covid). It was almost certainly a bug that you and your wife had already been exposed to but was hitting your kids for the first time.
I’m sorry about your son, but I hope you continue to be extremely cautious because you have lots of evidence your son did not have it in December.
I doubt I had the virus yet. Unless, I was asymptomatic? Odds are I will catch the virus in the next couple of years, before a vaccine is distributed.
My mom may be getting the antibody test.
I would never claim to know anything as far as medical, so I am curious what some others can add. I have read that there are many(more than just a few) strains of Covid 19? I have also read that some experts say antibodies would or Could only be effective for weeks and not months? I would guess this is due to mutations similar to flu in the sense of you may be immune to the strain you had, but not other strains.
Have any of you heard this or actually know if this is true or if we even know at this point?
There are many strains. Thousands of different genomes have been recorded but the differences are so small in most of them that the changes are unlikely to impact the effectiveness of antibodies or vaccines.
However there was recently a discovery that there has been a significant mutation that appears to be making one branch of mutations more contagious than the original strains. That line of viruses is the one hitting Europe and the East Coast (and probably Michigan).
It's possible that antibodies are only effective for weeks or months instead of years. They don't know yet. Antibodies for common cold coronaviruses have been shown in some cases to only be effective for a few weeks/months. In the case of those coronaviruses, I don't think it's the case that there are significant mutations (although we don't really study those very intensely), I think it's more the fact that the antibodies sometimes don't stay in our bloodstream for long.
Sopwith should be publishing more about this shortly.
Here's my take: There's a whole lot of Evangelicals who think that Trump is doing a swell job of bringing about the Apocalypse, and they're all on board, because they're gonna be Raptured before the sh#t really hits the fan. And then I read about Evangelicals ignoring social distancing guidelines to hold services in person, and a wave of infections and deaths as a result, including many ministers. Then I realized - THEY'RE BEING RAPTURED! So, all you snake-handling crackers just hold your camp meetings, shake hands, sneeze on each other and French kiss. Jeebus will welcome you into the afterlife after your ruralhospital has no respirator for you. Praise the Lord.