Vast Majority in US Remain Susceptible to COVID-19: Study

Fewer than 1 in 10 dialysis patients sampled had antibodies against the novel coronavirus as of July, indicating that the greater population is far from levels required to achieve herd immunity.

Max Kozlov

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Fewer than 10 percent of dialysis patients sampled in the US showed signs of having had COVID-19 as of late July, a sign that much of the population remains susceptible to the novel coronavirus, according to one of the largest studies of its kind published Friday (September 25) in The Lancet.

Researchers studied the prevalence of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 in a random subset of thousands of dialysis patients across the country. Their findings do not indicate exactly how many in the US are immune to the virus, as it is unclear how long immunity lasts and not every infected individual develops antibodies.

“We are still in the middle of the fight,” Eli Rosenberg, an epidemiologist at the State University of New York at Albany who was not part of the study, tells The Washington Post. “We’re all tired, and we’re all hoping for a vaccine. This shows ...

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Meet the Author

Max Kozlov
Max is a science journalist from Boston. Though he studied cognitive neuroscience, he now prefers to write about brains rather than research them. Prior to writing for The Scientist as an editorial intern in late 2020 and early 2021, Max worked at the Museum of Science in Boston, where his favorite part of the job was dressing in a giant bee costume and teaching children about honeybees. He was also a AAAS Mass Media Fellow, where he worked as a science reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Read more of his work at www.maxkozlov.com.
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