SO YOU JUST GOT A COVID-19 ANTIBODY TEST, NOW WHAT?
Unknown if their presence protects against reinfection
Wander the aisles of your local Ralphs and you’ll find fruits, veggies and a new test that tells you whether you have antibodies against the coronavirus.
But while the test might satisfy your curiosity, it’s unclear what else it can do.
Nearly a year into the pandemic, scientists still aren’t sure what to do with results from antibody tests, which reveal whether you previously had COVID-19. People once had high hopes that these tests could tell whether you could safely go back to work and resume normal activities.
In theory, that makes sense. Your immune system makes antibodies to grab onto the surface of a virus; if these
proteins latch tightly enough onto the coronavirus at the right spot, they could stop it from infecting your cells. Well, at least in theory.
“We don’t know if having a positive antibody test means that you have any immunity whatsoever,” said Dr. Davey Smith, an infectious disease expert at UC San Diego.
Scientists are still figuring out what kinds of antibodies work best against the coronavirus, how much antibody you need and how long immunity lasts. Smith and researchers at La Jolla Immunology are trying to answer many of these questions. The bottom line: If you test positive for antibodies to the coronavirus, you likely had COVID-19 earlier in the year.
The new antibody test, offered at all 77 Ralphs pharmacies throughout Southern California and the Central Coast, answers that question in about 15 minutes.
“We highly recommend this for those that feel they may have previously had COVID but never had a chance to get tested,” said Linh Lee, director of pharmacy for Ralphs. “I’ve had a lot of people come up to me and tell me, ‘Oh, my gosh, I was horribly sick in December. I swear I had COVID.’”
Ralphs announced the test’s launch Oct. 28 and is the only grocery store chain in California offering a rapid COVID-19 antibody test, according to Lee.
The company has been in the COVID-19 testing game for months. Back in July, Ralphs’ parent company, Kroger, began offering an athome COVID-19 test that allows customers to swab their noses, send samples off to a lab and find out if those samples contain the coronavirus. The antibody test, administered by a Ralphs pharmacist in-store, involves placing a single drop of blood from a finger
prick onto a pregnancy teststyle strip that detects two kinds of antibodies — those made soon after an infection (or during it), and those found weeks or months later.
The $25 test is not covered by insurance.
Those who test positive for antibodies made shortly after or during an infection are encouraged to get a standard COVID-19 test, Lee said. These are the nasal swab tests that detect if you’re currently infected. Otherwise, pharmacists offer the same guidance whether you test positive or negative for COVID-19 antibodies: Stick to public
health recommendations, such as wearing a mask and social distancing.
That counsel avoids one of the issues that most concerns Smith: antibody tests giving people a false sense of security.
“The real danger, I think, from those tests comes from people going to get those tests, having a positive result and then saying, ‘I don’t have anything to worry about,’” Smith said.
Test results get reported to California’s Department of Public Health and San Diego County, which has received more than 60,000 antibody test results.
But the county doesn’t use that data.
“There currently is not clear direction on how counties can or should use this data given that it primarily determines past infection, and the focus of testing has been on determining if people currently have the virus and what actions we should take to limit the spread,” said Craig Sturak, communications officer for the county’s Health and Human Services agency. That makes sense to Smith. Knowing what percent of the county has tested positive for COVID-19 antibodies could, at best, help public
health officials track the spread of the virus (assuming test results are accurate). But with no guarantee that antibodies protect against reinfection, he said, it doesn’t make sense to factor those results into the county’s reopening plans at this point.
“We have to be very careful about what the information means and what it doesn’t mean,” Smith said. “It can be dangerous to get that result and then take action when we really don’t know.”