As citizens continue to grapple with the pandemic that has engulfed the entire world, the number of Covid-19 cases have been rising incrementally in cities across India. In lieu of the impending situation, Thyrocare, India’s leading diagnostic laboratory chain, has announced the availability of ‘Covid Antibody Test’ to check your body’s response to COVID-19 infection. It is not a diagnostic test but is used for sero-surveillance to understand whether a person has encountered the infection in the recent past. The test kits and procedures have been approved by ICMR and Thyrocare has made the test available Pan India in all cities.

The test identifies if a person has had the novel coronavirus at some point in the past and has produced the antibodies to fight it. Thyrocare has made the tests widely available and has begun collecting the blood samples from the comfort of your homes in all major cities. The test doesn’t require fasting or any other precautionary measures to be followed.

These tests are primarily done to check whether your immune system, your body’s defense against illness has responded to the infection or not. It is done as sero-surveillance, which is a reference to understand the spread of infection in community by looking for antibody generation in an exposed individual. This test is not for diagnosis purposes. When someone is infected with the Covid-19 virus, the body’s immune system produces antibodies to fight the infection. This test lets you know if you have contracted the virus and have antibodies to fight it or you haven’t contracted the virus yet.

It is important to understand that antibodies are central to the body’s response to the COVID-19 infection. Globally, the Antibody tests have been heralded as a crucial weapon in the battle against the Covid-19 pandemic. This test will help us understand what percentage of our population got exposed to the virus and developed antibodies to fight the virus.

Thyrocare does the Covid Antibody IgG using ELISA technology and Covid Antibody Total using fully automated CLIA technology. A person can choose to do either of the tests or both the tests. Thyrocare’ s mission has always been to provide state-of -the art tests at extremely affordable prices to cater to large sections of society. The antibody testing is priced at INR 600 to make it accessible to the masses.

Dr. A. Velumani, Founder and CEO, Thyrocare Technologies says, “The antibody tests will equip us with data and information regarding the immunity levels of citizens in our country. We have conducted about 10,000 tests in cities where the virus is spreading rapidly in the last week out of which 6.8% of people have tested positive for the antibody tests.

If your antibody test is positive, it goes on to prove that your immune system is excellent and gives you raised immunoglobulins. This gives you confidence and builds your morale.  At Thyrocare we are continuing our sustained efforts to make sure we do our bit in this fight against the virus”.

This test will be essential for getting us out of our houses and back to work, and for easing the fear that has paralyzed the country. As the virus spreads rapidly in India, these tests will prove to be extremely crucial and important to bring back the normalcy.