• The Robert Koch Institute, Germany’s federal disease control and prevention agency, said in a statement translated by NPR that it has launched nationwide COVID-19 antibody testing.
• Officials in Germany believe that those who have had COVID-19 should have immunity from contracting the virus again, though it’s unknown how long it lasts or if antibodies give full immunity.
• The country will be using antibody testing to help monitor the spread of the coronavirus.
• Germany is the first European country to conduct nationwide antibody testing.
• Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

Germany is conducting nationwide testing for COVID-19 antibodies, becoming the first European country to do so.

The Robert Koch Institute, Germany’s federal disease control and prevention agency, said in a statement translated by NPR that the serological tests, also known as antibody tests, will help officials monitor the spread of the novel coronavirus.

The institute believes that people who have had the virus — all of whom should now have COVID-19 antibodies in their blood — should have immunity from contracting the virus again, though it’s unknown how long it lasts or if antibodies give full immunity.

Germany, which has a population of 83 million people, has had 149,381 confirmed COVID-19 cases, and 5,140 deaths from the virus.

The country has tested for COVID-19 on a larger scale than other countries in an attempt to help slow the spread of COVID-19. Officials have been testing an estimated 120,000 people a day.

Antibody testing has been seen as a crucial step to reopening public spaces, but the World Health Organization warned on Friday that antibodies can’t guarantee longterm immunity to COVID-19.

The WHO said antibody tests can show if a person has contracted the virus, but not necessarily if they’re immune to infection.

Science surrounding antibody testing is still developing, too, and concerns have emerged around the tests being inaccurate, rushed, and improperly marketed. More than 100 organizations are selling such tests in the US, but the US Food and Drug Administration has only approved a few.

Germany’s antibody testing could help provide more information on how many people have antibodies, at what levels, and what protection they could confer against the novel virus. The program launched last week and officials expect results sometime in May.

Officials said nationwide testing will take place in three parts. First, officials will examine samples from people who have donated blood. Then they will seek samples from people in regions hit hard by the coronavirus, and lastly they plan to study Germany’s larger population.

The Koch Institute said officials hope to examine 5,000 blood samples every two weeks.

“It is not yet known how many people in Germany have actually gone through an infection and are therefore immune,” the Koch Institute said in an April 9 press release translated by NPR. “The infection is often mild or even unnoticed.”