Antibody testing: not a panacea, still worth doing

We don't know for sure whether recovering from COVID-19 will confer lasting protective immunity. But, says the head of UW Virology, individuals and the public health system deserve all the information they can get.

On Tuesday, the University of Washington's Virology lab took in just under 1600 tests for the live coronavirus. But it also took in about a thousand tests from people who think they might have already had it and recovered.

Antibody testing is a blood draw looking for evidence that your body has already mounted a successful response to the virus. Dr. Keith Jerome, head of Virology at UW's Department of Laboratory Medicine, explained the hopes and unknowns surrounding test results.