Thread by @JewhadiTM

ICYMI: The First U.S. Test to Detect If a Person Has Potential Immunity to COVID-19 Was Just Developed leapsmag.com/breaking-the-f…

How close are we to rolling this test out to the public?

“Last week we started this process and we finished... today. Mt. Sinai is trying to roll this out in the next few days in the clinic to see which patients have been infected... recently or have been infected at all.”

Are there any bottlenecks to getting this rolled out?

There are no regulations that say you can’t... Research labs and hospitals... can do it. I’m not aware of supply chain issues... you need basic lab equipment & materials, but I don’t think those are in short supply right now

How does the test work?

“People coming to the hospital who are suspected to have infection with coronavirus, their blood gets taken routinely. This blood can be used for our test, too. The test will tell you if this person has antibodies against coronavirus.

You can also test the blood of people who are not currently sick to see if this person was infected, say, a month ago. If there are antibodies in the blood, you can say this person is probably immune to getting it again.

It will be essential workers who need to be tested first, like nurses, firefighters, and doctors. It will be great to know that they would not put themselves or others at risk by going back to work because they cannot spread the disease.”

How soon after infection does the test detect if you have antibodies?

“Usually after 7 days of infection.”

How long do the antibodies last to confer immunity?

“Those studies need to be done – right now it’s unclear. People probably cannot get reinfected once they mount a good immune response and have good antibody levels.”

“How long those level last still needs to be investigated. But they won’t get reinfected in the next, I would say, six months.”

How accurate is the test?

“Very accurate. The advantage – bad for us but good for the test – is that humans have no baseline immunity...”