In the Ibiza of the Alps ‘record number of antibodies’

In places where many people were together before the corona pandemic broke out, residents now often have the most antibodies in their blood. Tirol has the corona crown.

The population of the Tyrolean ski resort of Ischgl, where Austria’s largest corona outbreak occurred, has the highest percentage of antibodies (or antibodies) against the new corona virus to date. Scientists from the Medical University of Innsbruck state that. Antibodies have been found in as many as 42 percent of residents.

The antibody study #Ischgl is there, carried out by the Meduni Innsbruck: 42.4 percent (!) of those tested are antibody positive. 1473 people were tested, which corresponds to about 80 percent of the Ischgl population.

– Jakob Winter (@winter_jakob) June 25, 2020

Ibiza of the Alps

Thousands of people became infected in Ischgl, which praises itself as ‘the Ibiza of the Alps’. The virus was able to spread quickly in après ski bars, among other places. Someone tested positive for the first time on March 7, and a quarantine was instituted a week later. Tourists were allowed to travel back home, which spread the virus further through Europe.

Highest number

“The presence of antibodies is the highest found in a study to date,” said Dorothee von Laer, the director of the university’s virology institute. “Although there is no question of group immunity to this extent, the people of Ischgl should be highly protected.”

Testing

In other studies, it was stated that 10 percent of the inhabitants of Geneva and 27 percent of the inhabitants of the Italian Val Gardena have antibodies in their blood. Antibody tests and so-called PCR tests were performed on 1473 inhabitants of Ischgl, about 80 percent of the population. Only 15 percent of people with antibodies had previously tested positive for the lung virus, the university says.

Despite the early emergence of the coronavirus in Austria, the number of infections is relatively low. The lung virus has been diagnosed in a total of 17,477 people, of whom 693 have died.

What are antibodies?

Antibodies are an important weapon in the defense against infections. If you have it in your blood and have therefore been infected with the coronavirus, the chance of a new infection is much smaller. The extent to which the substances are found in blood donors gives an indication of the spread of the virus among the population.

If people have already had the virus, their body can react better in the future if the virus tries to re-enter the body. For the coronavirus, however, it is not certain that people are by definition immune after an initial infection.

Antibodies are important in the fight against corona, because a drug can be developed with them.

This weekend it was announced that Sanquin will receive 10 million euros from the government to collect large-scale plasma from recovered corona patients. This plasma contains antibodies against the virus, with which a drug can be developed. https://t.co/OwqKGT87As pic.twitter.com/PRGgZnamTj

– Sanquin (@sanquin) June 22, 2020

Brabant and Limburg

In our country, residents of North Brabant and Limburg have the most antibodies in their blood, Sanquin reported last week. The blood bank finds that from a closer analysis of the more than 7,000 blood samples that were tested between May 9 and 18. In the middle and east of Brabant and Limburg, between 8 and 10 percent of the samples examined were found to contain antibodies. Nationally, this was 5.4 percent, Sanquin reported earlier. A very big difference with the percentage in Ischl.

The fact that more people live with antibodies in Limburg and Brabant is in line with other figures about the corona pandemic. In the two southern provinces, relatively, most people also became infected and, relative to population size, were the most hospital admissions and deaths. The fact that, as in the après ski bars in Ischl, many people gathered during the carnival, which allowed the virus to take its course, certainly contributed to this

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