Towards herd immunity? New data suggests millions of Russians may have Covid-19 antibodies

As testing ramps up, a growing number of Russians are discovering that they have already had Covid-19. Results show almost 14 percent of people have immunity, meaning millions may have been infected.

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That’s according to Russia’s consumer rights watchdog, Rospotrebnadzor, citing hundreds of thousands of samples from across the world’s largest country.

Speaking at a meeting of the national Council for Combating Coronavirus, Anna Popova, Rospotrebnadzor’s chief, said the latest data shows how immunity has spread through different age groups.

“Almost 650 thousand people were tested in 46 regions,” she said, explaining that almost 14 percent of the tests came back positive.

If extrapolated to the rest of the country, 20 million of Russia’s estimated population of 146 million may have been infected.

Popova noted that children were found to have the highest level of immunity, with almost 20% of under-17s having immunity.

“14% of people between 18 to 64 years of age are immune, and only 11% of those 65 and older,” she explained.

She added that, in addition to checks for antibodies, over 13.5 million tests for current coronavirus infection have been conducted, with the results showing “a clear trend of decreasing growth rates.”

According to the latest government data, 493,657 people in Russia have been confirmed to have Covid-19. In the past day, 8,404 people have been diagnosed. As of Wednesday, Russia has the third-highest count of confirmed cases in the world, behind the US and Brazil.

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