South Africa Before The COVID Vaccine: The National COVID Antigen Study Findings
Epicentre Health Research
COVID Testing, Health research, and programme impact assessment
Epicentre visited 19 000 South Africans in all nine provinces to test them for COVID-19 in November 2020 – June 2021. Now the results from our study are out!
Why Should I Care?
This is big news because it gives us a window back in time before the COVID-19 vaccine was widely available in South Africa.
A time when an estimated 8 675 265 people in South Africa had antibodies for COVID-19.
So this study gives us an important snapshot of how susceptible South Africans were with our natural immunity.
We’ve got also answers to some monumental questions. Stuff we’ve been waiting on for a long time.
? Where did COVID hit the hardest, in South Africa?
? What age groups battled the most?
? & how did our antibodies cope against the different strains.
What Do The Statistics Say?
What Does This All Mean?
The NCAS study found that an estimated 8.7 million people in South Africa had been exposed to the COVID-19 virus from November 2020 to June 2021. This was 5x higher than the number of infections reported by PCR testing.
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This number is particularly important because all this information was gathered before COVID-19 vaccines were widely used in South Africa. According to the World Bank, South Africa’s population in 2020 was estimated to be approximately 59.31 million people. This means that a lot of people were still vulnerable to COVID-19 in 2021 something we all felt when omicron ripped through us. As by April 2022 our HUTS 2 study found that 97% of participants had COVID-19 antibodies.
Contrary to what the general person expected, this study found that rural areas, particularly farms, had a higher risk of infection. Overall, women living in rural formal areas were found to have the highest estimated antibodies at 28.9%.
All of this information, in addition to only half of antibodies being able to fight off COVID, show how important it is to get vaccinated and keep up your boosters.
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Learn More About Our Walk-In Lab
Epicentre has an extensive walk-in testing centre for both rapid and lab tests. Learn more here.
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