1.48-M ITALIANS HAVE COVID ANTIBODIES, TESTS SUGGEST

The results of serological tests conducted and analyzed by the Italian health ministry and statistics agency ISTAT suggest that 1.482 million people in Italy, or 2.5% of the resident population, have developed antibodies for SARS-COV2.

This estimate suggests that six times as many people have come into contact with the coronavirus than the number of confirmed cases identified so far, the Italian news agency ANSA reported late on August 3, 2020.

The "provisional' analysis is based on 64,660 serological tests taken as part of a campaign to see how widely the coronavirus has spread in the Italian population.

While the campaign failed to hit the target of doing 150,000 serological tests but the health ministry and ISTAT said the analysis was still valid.