Covid vaccination - want to know if you mounted a response to the vaccination?
7There is now a way to see if you responded to the vaccination. Quest Diagnostics Lab came out with a test that will show you either had covid or responded to the vaccination or both (it can’t tell them apart, anything greater than 1 is a response due to one or the other or both; the top of the scale appears to be >20, you need to get >1 to be pos).
It is called the Covid-19 Antibody test (SARS-CoV-2 AB IgG) Semi-quantitative test.
I found the information below (Quest Diagnostics Laboratory website)
https://education.questdiagnostics.com/faq/FAQ219
I also read their Feb. press release which gave information as well. The relevant part of that was: (copy/paste)
“We believe that SARS CoV-2 semi-quantitative serology testing will be an important clinical tool to assess if an individual has mounted an immune response from recent or prior infection or from vaccination,” said Jay G. Wohlgemuth M.D., Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer for Quest Diagnostics."
If you have or have had a blood cancer the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society is doing a study where they use LabCorp to collect blood and do the covid spike protein test (the vaccinations target that as the spike protein on the virus is what is used by the virus to attach to you). I was happy to see I had a response.
If you have had any kind of cancer there are two places I know of with a study: Mayo Clinic and the University of Texas Medical Center at San Antonio. There may be more but these are ones I know of at the moment (without doing an exhaustive search)
Going the study route means the test is free but it also means you have hoops to jump though (and the “cost” typically is access to your medical records). I do not know if the QuestDiagnostics lab test is covered by insurance - it may well be since it also tests for covid. I know that the spike protein antibody test is not covered by insurance as it is only approved for research purposes and not by the FDA for general use (although your mileage may vary or things may change over time).
Anyway cancer patients have much higher odds of dying of covid IF IF IF they are hospitalized with it (solid tumor most studies are around 36% and blood cancers most studies are around 51% although neither have been studied that well and results vary a bit and vary between kinds of cancer in the studies that had enough subjects to look at that). And cancer patients typically have a compromised immune system so respond less well to the vaccination, if at all (again few studies, smaller number of subjects, etc. but results are consistent). As a result these studies to look at response and response over time (eg multiple blood draws over time).
Research is sketchy at this point how well those numbers correspond to protection in the “real world” so this is also why there are studies going on.
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I give blood and platelets fairly often… The vampires really love me! Carter Bloodcare has been offering antibodies testing with each donation. I have always tested negative for antibodies. The last platelet donation was this past Saturday, approximately two weeks after my second vaccine. I will be curious to see if I test positive for antibodies now.
@ironcheftoni Give us an update and let us know.
@ironcheftoni I last donated blood about a month after my second Covid shot (#TeamModerna). I was confused and slightly concerned when my antibody test came back negative. But I donated double red cells and the antibodies reside in the plasma. Since they gave me my plasma back, I’m not even sure why they would test my donation for antibodies. I’m hoping that they’re still doing antibody tests when I donate next (which will be a whole blood donation) because I’m curious to see what the results of an antibody test are.
@ironcheftoni American red cross won’t take my blood… They say it’s because of mad cow disease, but I think it is systemic racism introduced by nursery rhymes claiming Englishmen have smelly blood.
@ironcheftoni I’m officially a 3+ gallon donor, but unofficially closer to 5 simply because I gave blood in my youth and it’s not been documented by my local red cross. I once saw someone celebrating his 10 gallon donation and I thought that was neat. I’ve actually gotten co-workers and friends to donate for the first time
@ironcheftoni @mbersiam
I’ve always wanted to donate blood but I can’t. I have a blood clotting disorder which requires me to take blood thinners. I still have a blood clot in my arm that is taking forever to go away from when I tried to go off them for a medical procedure. You guys that donate are great. I’ve been so close to a transfusion a couple times bc of almost bleeding out in surgery. I always try and get people to donate on behalf of people like me.
@phendrick it came up negative. But the reason may be because I donated Platelets. I am donating whole blood a week from saturday. That will be 30 days post second vaccine. We shall see.
@gt0163c At first they were testing for antibodies because it was believed that the plasma of people with the covid antibodies could be used in a transfusion for covid patients as a cure. I’m not sure if it has helped or not.
@mbersiam I am up to 8 gallons now. Not bad for someone so afraid of needles that it took three teachers and the school nurse to hold me down for a TB vaccine when I was a kid. I started donating in 2014 as a way to get over my fear of needles. I still don’t look. Thankfully Carter Bloodcare always has something good on TV or a bring a book.
@OnionSoup Cows with Guns
@ironcheftoni @OnionSoup lol on the video! Best 5 minutes I spent on YouTube in a long time. (I did my best to ignore spelling errors in the docs they showed, and the bad anatomy of the “he-cows”.)
@OnionSoup @phendrick it’s a classic!!
@ironcheftoni I get it. I hate needles too
@ironcheftoni @OnionSoup @phendrick I should have known the chickens would stage a coup.
The information also noted (FAQ #7):
So they’re saying they think it works (detecting COVID-19 antibodies), but they haven’t tested it for use as a “Did your vaccine shot work?” test or a “Have you been infected before with COVID-19?” test.
@mike808 The Quest test was just approved for the vaccine antibody testing per their press release BUT it can not tell the difference between antibodies from having covid or antbodies from having the vaccination (outside of the clinical trial for that test where they knew the covid status of someone prior to getting the vaccination). The value of this test is that apparently it is covered (or starting to be covered) by insurance and you can see if you have antibodies (although you won’t be positive if it is was because you had asymptomatic covid or due to the vaccination).
The spike protein antibody test (the vaccine focuses on the spike), that I got as part of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (LLS) clinical trial is a lab test that has only been used for research - for example those who have developed the vaccinations, the studies looking at how different people respond (and blood cancer patients don’t respond well, solid tumor cancer patients also don’t respond well but they respond far better than blood cancer patients do). You can only get this test as part of a clinical trial. It’s not open market and not covered by insurance. It has only been approved for research (so of course no FDA approval yet since you can’t get that done outside of a clinical trial).
The other thing people need to realize is that there are several antibody tests and they all don’t test for the same antibodies (although there is some overlap). As part of the clinical trial I am in is they used one covid test that doesn’t include spike protein antibody testing and included antibodies that the vaccination doesn’t trigger) so they could tell if we had covid (to the extent that someone had antibodies AND that they were still represent). As a result if we were neg for that one but pos for the spike protein one then the odds are higher that what they are looking at is the vaccination response.
Something can be approved for research but not FDA approved for general use. That is the situation with the spike protein only antibody test. Some of the covid antibody tests are approved for general use and some are restricted to clinical trials.
The purpose of the LLS trial (blood cancers only), the Mayo Clinic trial (all kinds of cancers), the University of Texas San Antonio trial (again all kinds of cancer patients) is to determine how well cancer patients respond to the vaccination as all of us were excluded from the clinical trials bringing those vaccinations to market.
The CDC recommendation is just that, a recommendation. For people without conditions that might affect vaccination response (eg compromised immune systems) it really makes little sense to test, outside of curiosity, since the response rate from the clinical trials was so good for all people in the trials. For those of us with issues that may affect our response, or had shot one and two spread out well beyond the recommendations it might make sense. And we weren’t included in those trials anyway so far less is known how we’d respond. And as it turns out for cancer patients - often not as well, especially for blood cancer patients. What to do about that is unknown and will be looked at too.
While there is on going research to see what happens when you spread out the shots further than the original clinical trials recommend (eg and tested), those folks might want to see if spreading them out too far reduced their personal response since we don’t have an answer to that either.
@Kidsandliz I wasn’t downplaying the research, or the benefits. I was just noting that it still will be a while before the general public can go down to Walgreens or CVS and pick up a “Did my vaccine shot work?” kind of test.
Then again we thought it would be about 2 to 3 years before we would get a vaccine, so there is that going for humankind. With some luck, the species might even survive long enough to go extinct from our own climate change consequences instead of some hoax virus from Jina and the deep state conspiracy of libtard pizza parlor pedophiles sacrificing infants and drinking blood orange juice.
@Kidsandliz
Just a follow up here. Gave blood on March 3; COVID test was negative (as expected). Got vaccinated with Moderna in March/early April. Gave blood on April 28, finally got COVID test results. Listed as “Reactive”, which is what is expected post-vaccination https://www.redcrossblood.org/donate-blood/dlp/covid-19-antibody-test-details.html
@lehigh Well cool you found out for free while doing something good!