Antibody tests can provide evidence of early spread, but they have limitations
My response to critics who say antibody results don’t support “early spread.”
Many people claim the antibody studies that were performed by mid-2020 don’t show enough “community prevalence” or “positives” to support my view that large numbers of citizens had already been infected by the coronavirus by the date of the lockdowns (approximately March 15, 2020).
However, it's crucial to note when large numbers of people started to receive these tests.
In America, this didn't happen until late April/early May 2020 ... and then few people got them.
Frankly, I am skeptical the antibody results we have seen captured or identified all of the people who had really been infected earlier. I think these antibody tests capture some of the "prior infections" but no where close to all of them.
In many people, antibodies fade in two to three months
Per the research that’s most convincing to me, "detectable" levels of antibodies fade in many people within "two to three months."
So if most people didn't start to receive antibody tests until May 2020 - and most people actually had Covid in the “cold and flu” months of November 2019 through February 2020 - these results wouldn't show up as "positives" in some unknown percentage of people.
I would like to see antibody test results that were widely given to people between, say, Feb. 15 and March 15th, 2020. In my view, those hypothetical tests would have revealed far more positives. Alas, we can't go back in time and give these tests to people in this time.
Officials tell us that the dubious PCR tests are the only way to “confirm” a positive “case” … but only a few thousand Americans had received these tests by early March 2020. The first PCR tests wasn’t administered until mid-January 2020.
So unless someone invents a time machine and carries testing kits back with him, no “PCR positive” results are going to “prove” that any person had Covid in the year 2019.
This is quite convenient to experts and authorities who might not want anyone to know this virus was already spreading widely in this country months before the lockdowns.
For better or worse, antibody tests are the only assay that can provide “evidence of prior infection.”
But, as noted, these tests have significant limitations.
For example, people who experienced more pronounced Covid symptoms or severe cases are far more likely to test positive on antibody tests months later than people who had mild or asymptomatic cases.
Said differently, those who experienced mild or asymptomatic cases are far less likely to test positive for antibodies many months later. (This is actually the majority of people who had Covid).
Also, some percentage of people (1 to 10 percent) never develop detectable levels of IgG or IgM antibodies.
Speaking for myself, I also don't fully trust the labs or companies that do the bulk of this testing. IMO they are all Fauci partners. To cite one example, I wonder about the "cutoff values" used in these “authorized” tests.
I'd be more inclined to trust the results of the independent labs and in-house tests. These are the labs/clinics that produced antibody results which show far-higher prevalence.
Many of the tests administered by independent labs and clinics are called "junk tests.” In my view, one should consider the source when looking at the experts who are making these disparaging claims.
What they are really saying is: “Trust only our tests. Don’t trust the tests of those guys.”
When I see such statements, my initial reaction is, “No, I’m more inclined to trust the people you say are untrustworthy … because I don’t trust you.”
In general, I would add X percent to every antibody study or group of test results we've seen from Abbott Labs or whatever companies performed most of the "authorized" early antibody tests.
The only pre-January 2020, antibody test in America done of "archived blood" showed that 2.03 percent of blood donors from Washington, Oregon and California, did have Covid antibodies. These are the numbers the CDC reported in its “Red Cross Blood Study” (the study that took 11 1/2 months to publish).
I'd add 2 or 3 percent to this figure. But even if one considers these results as gospel or infallible … if 2 percent of residents in the these three states had Covid in November 2019 (which is what this result is really telling us), this figure would have grown to 4, 5 or 6 percent 30 days in the future … if the virus is/was as contagious as I believe it is (and all the experts said it is).
My personal Covid anecdote …
I had all the Covid symptoms in mid-January 2020. I was sick enough to go to the doctor, which I rarely do. I tested negative for the flu. I then got an antibody test in mid-May - four months after my symptoms. The results was "negative." But I still think I had Covid.
In three years since, I never tested positive for Covid via a PCR test (and I was forced to get two).
My two children were sick when I was. They also tested negative for the flu. Since January 2020, they’ve been to the pediatrician multiple times and received several other PCR tests ... and never tested positive for Covid.
While this is anecdotal information, to me this suggests that all three of us acquired natural immunity from whatever illness we had back in January 2020.
In my article on how officials perhaps concealed evidence of early spread, I noted one way officials achieved this goal. They simply "throttled access" to early antibody tests. (“Throttled access” is the words used by a journalist for The Seattle Times … not my words - but I think the description is apt and also significant).
Early antibody results have never been revealed
by public health agencies
We also don't know how many Americans actually tested positive for Covid via antibody tests administered between March and May 2020. Public health officials have never released this information.
In May 2020, The Palm Beach Post asked for this information (and, per the paper’s reporting, labs apparently provided this information to the State) but state health agencies won't tell the public the figures or percentages. And still haven’t to this day.
In other words, the antibody evidence of early spread must be far greater than I’ve reported. This evidence has simply been concealed from the public. (Most people who received positive results did NOT call their local newspaper and report this … And if they did, most papers probably wouldn’t write this story).
Mayor Michael Melham of Belleville, NJ actually released a press statement announcing his positive antibody results ... and, boy, was he attacked by the press for having the temerity to say he's convinced he had Covid (based on two positive antibody tests and his symptoms).
Concluding points …
We'll never know what the real early antibody numbers are/were.
As I’ve tried to highlight in multiple articles, the CDC could have tested more archived blood but, for some reason, did not do this. I think I know why they didn't do this.
While most experts and critics state that antibody tests do NOT support the early-spread hypothesis .. I look at other antibody results (especially the individual results we do know about) and say, yes they do.
In my opinion, these tests aren't capturing anywhere close to all the people who had early cases…. but they captured enough.
I believe antibody tests - at least those performed as of mid-2020 - undercount the number of people who actually had a “prior infection.” That is, the number of “false negatives” is probably much greater than the number of “false positives.”
.. If one person in Town X tested positive for antibodies on some date in 2019, this result actually tells us that at least two people had the virus by that date (as some unknown person infected the person who later got a positive antibody result).
By itself, this information tells us the virus was “spreading” from one person to another.
What my “expert” critics are asking me to believe is that the chain of virus transmission likely stopped with just these two people. I don’t think it would have.
If two people in any town had Covid in November or December 2019, a lot of other people in this town probably had it too. And I doubt the chain of person-to-person transmission stopped at the city limits sign in this town.
Contagious viruses keep on spreading … that’s what they do … at least in this non-expert’s contrarian opinion.
Silly you.
Using common sense.
You're obviously not an expert.
A buddy of mine had a nasty bug in Jan of 2020, which knocked him out of commission for about three weeks. I got it from him, but for me it was only a bad cold, and I knocked it back in a couple of days with high doses of vitamin C. Was it the coof? Difficult to say, though I haven't been sick since then. I haven't taken any of the shots and I've never done a PCR test either. I couldn't see the need to if I wasn't sick, and if I HAD gotten sick, what was the test going to do? They weren't offering any treatment, just telling people to go home. Well I can figure out to do that on my own without your pointless test, so how about I save everyone some time and just skip a step?