Study: Almost two-thirds of the world's population now have antibodies to COVID-19

According to the new research, about two-thirds of the world's population today have antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, either as a result of vaccination or as a result of exposure to the virus.

This conclusion was reached by scientists from the World Health Organization (WHO), who studied hundreds of different studies. seroprevalence from January 2020 to April 2022, covering information on more than 5 million people from all over the world. 40% of these studies focused on people from low- and middle-income countries, who are often overlooked in this kind of research.

Scientists have calculated that the global seroprevalence of SARS-CoV-2 - the proportion of people who had antibodies to the virus - increased from 7.7% in June 2020 to 59.2% in September 2021. Since then, this number has likely increased.

According to the information WHO panels, as of November 10, 2022, there were 630 million confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 6.5 million reported deaths. If this latest study is true, it suggests that perhaps billions of people have come into contact with the virus.

But unfortunately, this does not necessarily mean that all these people are immune to the disease just because they have antibodies. The risk of re-infection with an immune-evading omicron variant is still quite high.

The authors of the paper believe that this study highlights the need to monitor how the world is gradually getting used to this terrible virus. And that monitoring the spread of COVID-19 is still necessary to better be prepared for other respiratory pathogens.