PORTLAND, Ore. — With testing ramped up for current infections in Oregon, the next step will be testing to see if you ever had COVID-19 over the past couple months.
The goal of the antibody test is to find antibodies made by your body during its battle with the virus. Even after the battle, the antibodies remain and will tell researchers what they fought.
A typical procedure involves drawing some of your blood then spinning it to separate out the plasma where the antibodies live.
In Oregon, antibody testing is not widely available yet.
This week, Quest Diagnostics created a test that allows anyone to get an antibody test at one of their local blood labs. A doctor at the lab screens patients and results.
But should you get one now? Dr. Jennifer Vines, the public health officer for Multnomah County, is skeptical about the positive tests.
“The positive is more difficult because it’s not clear...it’s not clear what level of immunity that signifies. It doesn’t tell us how long you have that kind of immunity and it's certainly no guarantee against either getting re-infected, or the possibility that you’ve had a false positive test,” Dr. Vines said.
Vines says antibody testing will be helpful to show the percentage of the population that was infected, but warns we should not individually use the test to feel we are protected.
“I think there’s this hope that maybe the virus has moved through our community and some of us just had a mild infection or no symptoms at all. I certainly share that wish for us. Unfortunately, I’m not sure that’s true. The way to know that would be to look at antibody testing across the population,” said Dr. Vines.
She believes a lot of people are not immune to the virus in our community.
The former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Scott Gottlieb, agrees antibody testing should not make us feel bulletproof.
“I don’t think individuals should rely on the results of these tests. The tests that are on the market right now are very variable in terms of their quality. There are some tests that have what we call a high specificity, which means they are pretty accurate. But most of them aren’t – most of them have not undergone any FDA review,” Dr. Gottlieb said.
Seven companies have applied for and been given emergency authorization to perform antibody tests. Click here for the list from the FDA.
