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Coronavirus infections in the US are likely much higher than initially reported, according to a report recently released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The agency report suggests that people who did not have any symptoms of Covid-19 unknowingly transmitted the virus in their communities, underscoring early warnings from health officials that the tests only capture a fraction of the scale of infections.
For most areas, “infections are likely to occur more than 10 times more” than reported cases, although most residents had no symptoms, according to the report. With nearly 4 million cases identified in the US since the start of the outbreak, the CDC report suggests that more than 40 million people were infected.
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According to the CDC, data from antibody tests conducted in 10 cities found that reported infections “probably underestimate the prevalence of infection in affected communities.” Antibody tests can be used to determine previous infections.
“The findings may reflect the number of people who had no or mild illness, or who did not seek medical attention or undergo testing, but who may still have contributed to continued transmission of the virus in the population,” the agency said.
In Missouri, the CDC found that the infection rate is 13 times higher than the reported rate, The New York Times reported. Utah infections were double what was reported.
CDC collected blood samples taken during routine exams from late March to mid-April, capturing the status of the virus before a recent spike in infections that started in June.
A report released in June showed data from just six cities. The July study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association includes four others.
Blood samples were also collected from commercial laboratories in Connecticut, Louisiana, Minnesota, New York, Philadelphia, the San Francisco Bay area, southern Florida, Utah, and Washington state.
New York’s infection rate increased from 6.9 percent on April 1 to more than 23 percent on May 6, reflecting the magnitude of the outbreak as the state became a global epicenter for the virus.
But the results show that even in heavily affected areas like New York City, the infection rate is still much lower than necessary to meet the 60 to 70 percent threshold for “collective immunity.”
Approximately 40 percent of infected people do not have any symptoms. Health officials and medical experts have emphasized that Americans should follow preventive guidelines such as wearing face covers and staying physically distant from others in public to avoid unknowing transmission from exposure to the virus.
More than 3.8 million confirmed infections have been reported in the United States, according to Johns Hopkins University. Currently, the United States evaluates approximately 700,000 people daily. The nation’s death toll has exceeded 140,000.
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