Quote Originally Posted by Curt Harms View Post
I'm hoping for a widely available antibody test soon. People who have developed immunity should be able to go back to their jobs without endangering others. I've heard of a couple studies in California that indicate infections are MUCH more common than previously estimated so serious/life threatening infections per 1,000 people is much lower than projected. I have no idea if those studies are legitimate or representative of larger populations. We need larger samples rather than small samples with lots of SWAGs derived from those small samples.
Exactly. IMO until a massive program for testing antibodies starts we will not know for sure about the future. I respect the experts, but truthfully all we have done so far is act on models and suppositions.

I am confident the true mortality rate will be much lower once this is determined. (This is the so called "denominator" they talk about). We already know the virus has been around CA longer than thought. Serology studies indicate 50-80X as many people had antibodies than expected. This means there are a multitude of people who have been infected and recovered (herd immunity!)

Mutation is another issue, and my be what's behind so many experts claiming antibodies may not protect you (because this is quite incorrect for most infections with the exception of some classes like HIV). Apparently many variants have already been identified by researchers in China (I don't believe much from China, but no reason not to believe this). Typically mutations results in differing levels of virulence, IOW the virus can either be weaker or stronger.

Could this be the reason why some countries seem to be hit harder than others? We will eventually find out I'm sure the studies are already underway. CA has not been hit has hard as NY and that has a lot of people wondering. The thinking is CA "beat" the virus with strict quarantine measures, while NY lagged in their response.

But what if CA got a different variant direct from Wuhan and it happens to be less virulent? 1000's of people fly back and forth from CA to China every day, perhaps they got the "Wuhan" virus and NY got a different variant from Europe?

If this is true it has huge implications on vaccine development, because the most virulent variants would have to be identified and a multivalent vaccine would have to be developed.