Estimates say only 10% of the population have immunity to CV following infection. This isn't enough for herd immunity

[goldpartyhat]

Obviously without testing the general population we won't know for certain, but this doesn't look good for ending/relaxing the lockdown, without another huge spike in infections.

I'm hoping by the end of April antibody testing and active infection and tracing can be starting, so that by June we can have a clearer picture of everything.

Forgive me, but we're basically the little pigs hiding in the house of bricks hoping the wolf doesn't climb down the chimney, aren't we?

I wonder if Germany will have a massive peak if they come abruptly out of lockdown. Very few of their population have had the virus so I suspect herd immunity is minuscule.

I'm not sure that's true. Germany have had almost twice the number of confirmed cases we have.

Now, they've done essay more testing and have far fewer dead, so possibly they have just caught a much bigger proportion of cases. Still part of the reason for the low death rate is superb case management, so it's very hard to estimate real numbers of cases at the moment.

Also - re a vaccine. It's not that we WILL have one in 12-18 months. It's the EARLIEST.

There's so hope that it could be sooner. Front page of the Times today:

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/coronavirus-vaccine-could-be-ready-by-september-flmwl257x?shareToken=d345348337f91e0c808418d2eef94f5e

And and interview with the lead researcher.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/many-of-us-have-been-saying-for-years-that-we-need-more-vaccines-snczprdrn?shareToken=93c6cd0d5ac3e3e21710348cf801289c

A small Chinese study has found low levels of anibodies in recovered patients. Portentially meaning that immunity levels are low.

10% have had CV?

Both seem to be talked about in posts

Neither. It's:

Some epidemiologists have estimated that 10% of the population have no had CV, many asymptomatically. But others differ

Scarveola isn’t that the second with estimation errors included (which yes are present of course)

So those who have had it can probably catch it again and best case scenario we can have a vaccine in September?

That still sadly doesnt explain what will happen when furlough runs out in 2 months and how anyone in London will be able to social distance on the tube on their way to work between june and September...

The other think that has not been mentioned is if you do get the virus how your health will be in the future. The scientists just don’t know. The virus damages the lungs and we may find people with long term lung disease. The virus could be like Herpes and stay in the body and flare up when the person’s immunity is low. Who knows , I don’t think the scientists do. So any mention of Herd immunity is a worrying concept.

I was looking at details of when each country shielded their vulnerable and Germany did this way before the rest of Europe which may go a long way to explaining why they have seen low death rates.

I don't know if one in ten has had it but right now it seems like one in five that walks past my window is coughing. I guess I am just more aware of it!

A small Chinese study has found low levels of anibodies in recovered patients. Portentially meaning that immunity levels are low

Thanks for the link, @AutumnLeavesSeptember

They found that 30% of recovered patients only had low levels of antibodies. That has implications for herd immunity and vaccine design but it doesn't mean that immunity levels are "low" as such or that people don't develop immunity, just that some people don't.

It's interesting that antibody levels increase with age, people in the 60-85 age group having 3 times the level of antibodies than the 15-39 age group. Most of the people with low levels were young and in the age group that are least likely to have severe symptoms.

If their hypothesis that it could be because they fought off the virus with a different type of immune response is correct, maybe that could be linked to more recent vaccination (eg BCG) or recent infection with another disease that is more prevalent in younger people.

I thought the chinese study was very interesting - we need far more scientific info before we can even discuss immunity to suppress virus. 10 people out of 200 people in the study had no antibodies at all - and so woud be reinfected.

We don't know if the 30% of people with suprisingly low antibodies are immune either. Interestingly, it was the young people in the study who had no or few antibodies - does this mean young people do not become immune? We have no idea- until we do to pesue herd immunity is insanity.

In terms of drugs - they are currently trialling already licensed drugs thus they would be safe to use in a few months if effective.

This could be good news. A study in Germany has shown that 15% of people they tested showed immunity to coronavirus, including people who had no symptoms. That's a lot higher than any estimates. I think the Imperial study estimated 0.72% in Germany on 28 March:

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/09/many-people-may-already-have-immunity-coronavirus-german-study/?WT.mc_id=e_DM1232947&WT.tsrc=email&etype=Loy_Dig_Acq_Election_0-9MEngagement&utmsource=email&utm_medium=Loy_Dig_Acq_Election_0-9MEngagement20200411&utm_campaign=DM1232947

Ha ha ha. BBC are NOT a source for science.