Imperial College London boffins are now warning of “waning immunity” to Covid-19 over time, after the UK’s largest antibody study measured a significant drop. 350,000 people in England have taken antibody tests as part of Imperial’s surveying ‘REACT-2’ study so far. In June and July, 60 in 1,000 people had detectable antibodies. Yet as of September, this had fallen to just 44 per 1,000 people were positive. A 26% drop in the number of people with antibodies in just three months…
Despite the study not monitoring ‘T Cells’, which also play a role in immune system responses, Professor Wendy Barclay told the BBC, “On the balance of evidence, I would say it would look as if immunity declines away at the same rate as antibodies decline away, and that this is an indication of waning immunity.” Rather denting herd immunity theories…
Concerningly, the fall was greater among older patients. Professor Paul Elliott, who directs the program at Imperial, told the Today Programme this morning it now “doesn’t seem to be the case” that lifelong immunity can come about from contracting the virus.
The silver lining, however, is that Professor Elliott also said the body responds to a vaccine in a different way to real infection – and the scientists are increasing confident about a vaccine…
UPDATE: A co-conspirator who was a subject of the Imperial study has sent in this disclaimer that the study’s subjects had to sign off on.
Worrying…
