Around 2 percent of Red Cross blood donors have COVID-19 antibodies
Photo by Sebastian Kahnert / picture alliance via Getty Images
Just under 2 percent of people who donated blood to the American Red Cross this summer had coronavirus antibodies, showing that very few people in the United States have been exposed to the virus that’s ravaged the country. The organization started offering antibody tests to donors in early June, and it published the results of the program in the Journal of the American Medical Association this week.
The Red Cross tested just under 1 million blood donations for antibodies over the course of the summer. When the antibody testing program started, about 1.18 percent of people who donated blood were positive. By the end of August, 2.58 percent of the people donating blood had antibodies.
Tracking the number of people with antibodies gives...