CVS offers COVID antibody tests
CVS MinuteClinics are offering coronavirus antibody tests throughout Connecticut for those who wonder whether they have had COVID-19, especially back when testing for the disease was not common.
“I think it’s useful to have that information because it lets them know,” said Mara Chamoures, a nurse practitioner at the MinuteClinic in Southbury. “I think people are eager to know whether they had COVID or not.”
Chamoures said the antibody test, which is done using a finger stick to collect blood and gives results in fewer than 15 minutes, can answer questions for people who have had symptoms they believe may have been from a case of COVID. “Maybe somebody lost their taste and they haven’t gotten it back yet,” or have a lingering cough or fatigue, she said.
However, she said an antibody test should not be used to decide whether to get vaccinated. “Regardless of whether they show antibodies to COVID-19, they should still get the vaccine,” Chamoures said. “We do tell them, just because you have the positive results showing you have the immunity to COVID, we don’t know how long that immunity lasts.”
She also said getting an antibody test should not prevent anyone from continuing to wear a mask and keeping socially distant from others.
Dr. Marie Louise Landry, director of the Clinical Virology Laboratory at Yale New Haven Hospital, also cautioned about relying too much on antibody tests for the coronavirus, formally known as SARS CoV-2, which she said vary in their accuracy, especially if someone has had a mild case of COVID.
Landry also is a professor of laboratory medicine and of infectious disease medicine at the Yale School of Medicine. She said the only clinical use for antibody testing recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is to diagnose multi-inflammatory syndrome in children because those patients may not come to the hospital until after a viral PCR test has turned negative.
Landry also warned against deciding not to get vaccinated based on a positive antibody test.
“Right now, they’re recommending that people who have had COVID infection still be vaccinated to boost immune response and not to use antibodies to make that decision,” she said.
Landry said an antibody test also should not be used to decide whether to return to work or school or whether to travel. Antibodies appear 11 to 14 days after infection, so an antibody test cannot be used to determine whether a person is infected, she said.
Having antibodies in the bloodstream also does not mean a person is immune to the virus or for how long immunity may last. “We don’t have enough information yet to know what level of antibodies might be protective,” Landry said. For other vaccines, such as rubella, the level of antibodies that provides protection is known. “We don’t know what that level is yet for SARS CoV-2 or COVID,” Landry said.
“Added to that, we’re seeing viral variants and that is a big concern, as well,” because it is not certain that antibodies will protect as well against them, she said. However, “we still do feel that the vaccines have a benefit” against variants, she said.
Landry said, “although there may be a slight reduction in protection” against variants, vaccines are encouraged, “most importantly to protect against severe disease and hospitalization and mortality, and that’s key.”
MinuteClinic’s antibody test costs $38 and is covered by Medicaid and Medicare but not by private insurance, Chamoures said. No appointment is necessary. CVS also offers PCR tests and vaccines for COVID-19.
CVS Health, based in Woonsocket, R.I., operates MinuteClinics in 1,100 CVS stores in 33 states and Washington, D.C.