KGMU begins antibody tests for coronavirus

LUCKNOW: The King George’s Medical University (KGMU) has begun antibody test among people to examine if they have developed anti-body against Covid-19.

Primarily the tests are conducted on health workers, healthy individuals who want to be part of the study and voluntary blood donors coming to the blood bank.

“Tests are being done on people who never had tested positive or treated for any coronavirus symptoms. The results are expected to give us an idea on herd immunity in the community,” said Tulika Chandra, head of department, transfusion medicine, KGMU.

The target is to conduct 5,000 tests but the data will be released after phase one of 1,000 tests, she said.

“Of the sampling already done, about 2% samples have shown to have anti-bodies. But it is too early to give a trend. We hope to share the results next week when a good number of samples are done,” she said, when asked about the results.

Till now about 400 samples have been collected from different healthy individuals.

Antibody testing determines whether an individual has had

Covid-19 infection in the recent past and then developed antibodies against the virus.

The body makes antibodies when it fights an infection, such as the Covid-19. People with an adaptive immune response to the infection can be identified

› Of the sampling already done, about 2% samples have shown to have anti-bodies. But it is too early to give a trend. TULIKA CHANDRA, head of department, transfusion medicine, KGMU

with tests.

This will indicate if they had been infected recently.

“We will be looking for the immunoglobulin G levels in the samples taken, as this reflects whether a person has developed antibody against the virus or not,” said Prof Chandra.

“The results will indicate whether herd immunity is being built by people in the community against Covid-19,” she said.

While health care workers give their samples for tests, samples from voluntary blood donors coming to the blood bank is taken from the donated blood and is being used for testing for anti-bodies, she said.