U of R biologist says antibodies could help determine end of pandemic

A biologist at the University of Regina thinks the health authority adding in antibody testing could help in the fight against COVID-19.

Josef Buttigieg is an associate professor of biology and said his interest is in neuro-immunological diseases like multiple sclerosis.

Right now the province is just testing for the active virus, which tells us which people are sick at the time and whether they’re infectious. Buttigieg said we should also be testing for COVID-19 antibodies.

“What happens if, let’s say a month, or two, or three months ago you were exposed to the virus. If I were to test you for that you would show up as being negative for the virus because you don’t have it. But if you were to test for those antibodies … then it would determine that you’ve already been exposed to that virus,” explained Buttigieg.

He said the antibody test could tell us who might be immune to getting the disease and who won’t spread it to others.

Buttigieg explained this could be important when it comes to front line workers and healthcare workers – those who aren’t going to spread the disease would be the best choice to work with high-risk patients.

He also said it could be useful in projecting the virus’s timeline.

“We could determine how many people in the environment do have this antibody, then we could start looking at what’s the end stage, how many more months, weeks, or years for that matter would it take us to get a sufficient number of individuals that are immune to this.”

Buttigieg said he thinks of it as having another layer of safety, like wearing personal protective equipment.