Coronavirus Numbers: What About Those Making A Recovery?
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - If there is one thing that has characterized this coronavirus pandemic, it's numbers: A few good, many scary and almost all confusing.
There's a number of tests, cases, deaths, hospital and ICU beds, ventilators needed, and much more, reports CBS2's Dr. Max Gomez.
There is a number that we haven't heard much about that could be a key to beginning to get our world back to normal: The number of people who've recovered from COVID-19 infection.
The Johns Hopkins site tracks total cases and total number of recovered patients, about 25% of confirmed cases, but there's no good way to know how many people got infected and recovered without ever being hospitalized or even tested. Most estimates are that 80% of those infected will recover.
All those millions who have and will recover will have made antibodies against corona, antibodies that will almost certainly protect them against re-infection for what may be a significant period of time.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo has said that those people will have those protective antibodies extracted from their blood, a fairly minor procedure similar to donating blood. Those antibodies will then be given to very sick COVID-19 patients to see if they might be an effective treatment.
It's a technique that's been used for years against numerous infections including chickenpox, measles, rubella and even used to save people who've been bitten by poisonous snakes.
We don't know if it will work against coronavirus until it has been tested but it's a much-needed glimmer of hope.
