It's a study with a small sample size, and hasn't been peer reviewed.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/around-third-those-no-coronavirus-185927281.html
Up to a third of healthy people without symptoms of coronavirus may have developed immunity to it, international research suggests.
The findings suggest that public immunity could be as much as twice that found in antibody tests, meaning infection hotspots such as London could be further along the path to herd immunity than thought, and come after a study of an Italian town that was among the first in Europe to be hit by the virus showed that 40 per cent of those infected had no symptoms.
Until now, efforts to measure levels of protection against coronavirus have focused on antibodies, which have proved an unreliable measure.
At the start of the pandemic, Government advisers suggested at least 60 per cent of the population would need to be infected in order for herd immunity to be achieved. Instead, Britain entered lockdown on the basis of projections suggesting that allowing such levels of the disease would leave the NHS overwhelmed.
But a new study, by Sweden's Karolinska Institutet, suggests immunity levels in those without symptoms may be twice as high as thought.
It comes as statistics revealed that one in seven children in Leicester have now tested positive for coronavirus, with levels tripling in the last month. On Tuesday, Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, said an "unusually high" incidence of coronavirus in children in the city had prompted ministers to shut down its schools and order it into lockdown.
The Telegraph has established that prevalence is now at 15 per cent among under-18s in Leicester – roughly three times greater than in England overall. Mr Hancock stressed that children were highly unlikely to get ill from the virus but might transmit it.
The Karolinska Institutet research on more than 200 adults, including healthy blood donors, was carried out in Sweden – the only country in Europe to avoid a lockdown.
As well as measuring antibody levels, tests examined levels of T-cell response. T-cells are a type of white blood cell that helps the immune system fightviruses, and are increasingly thought to have a key role in battling coronavirus.
In total, 30 per cent of the healthy blood donors were found to have developed "T-cell immunity" – twice the number of cases in which antibodies were detected.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/around-third-those-no-coronavirus-185927281.html
Up to a third of healthy people without symptoms of coronavirus may have developed immunity to it, international research suggests.
The findings suggest that public immunity could be as much as twice that found in antibody tests, meaning infection hotspots such as London could be further along the path to herd immunity than thought, and come after a study of an Italian town that was among the first in Europe to be hit by the virus showed that 40 per cent of those infected had no symptoms.
Until now, efforts to measure levels of protection against coronavirus have focused on antibodies, which have proved an unreliable measure.
At the start of the pandemic, Government advisers suggested at least 60 per cent of the population would need to be infected in order for herd immunity to be achieved. Instead, Britain entered lockdown on the basis of projections suggesting that allowing such levels of the disease would leave the NHS overwhelmed.
But a new study, by Sweden's Karolinska Institutet, suggests immunity levels in those without symptoms may be twice as high as thought.
It comes as statistics revealed that one in seven children in Leicester have now tested positive for coronavirus, with levels tripling in the last month. On Tuesday, Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, said an "unusually high" incidence of coronavirus in children in the city had prompted ministers to shut down its schools and order it into lockdown.
The Telegraph has established that prevalence is now at 15 per cent among under-18s in Leicester – roughly three times greater than in England overall. Mr Hancock stressed that children were highly unlikely to get ill from the virus but might transmit it.
The Karolinska Institutet research on more than 200 adults, including healthy blood donors, was carried out in Sweden – the only country in Europe to avoid a lockdown.
As well as measuring antibody levels, tests examined levels of T-cell response. T-cells are a type of white blood cell that helps the immune system fightviruses, and are increasingly thought to have a key role in battling coronavirus.
In total, 30 per cent of the healthy blood donors were found to have developed "T-cell immunity" – twice the number of cases in which antibodies were detected.
