New lit review post, this one on #COVID19 antibody testing.https://srconstantin.github.io/2020/04/27/antibody-testing.html …
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tl;dr: you know those new antibody test results saying way more people have asymptomatic virus than was thought possible, and thus we don't have to worry about it because it's low risk?
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Yeah nope. Even the *optimistic* assumptions projected from those antibody studies suggest that the US would have a per-capita death rate comparable to the Spanish Flu if we let it go completely unchecked. Not good.
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Also, you know how the CDC said there was "no evidence" that antibodies against COVID-19 would protect you against reinfection?
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Also nope. There's no evidence *in COVID-19*, but I found very consistent evidence across 6 different viruses, including a coronavirus, that higher virus-specific antibody levels predict lower risk of symptomatic infection with that virus.
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There are virus studies in which a *detectable* antibody titer can still precede symptomatic (re)infection, so I wouldn't go around assuming that a positive test result on one of those yes/no drive-thru tests means you literally can't get COVID19.
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But is, for instance, antibody response a plausible initial proxy for testing whether a vaccine candidate is protective against COVID19? Yeah, probably. It's a standard endpoint in the development of other viral vaccines.
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Also, it depends what the antibody tests are being used for. As a population measure of how many people have been infected with COVID-19? They're good, PLEASE DO MOAR ANTIBODY TESTS.
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Replying to @s_r_constantin
The problem is that antibodies aren't completely selective to a single target, so you get false positives. And current tests have a significant and not-really-known false positive rate. So unfortunately, we just don't know.
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Already priced into my calculations
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