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New Delhi: In Iran, 17.1 per cent people might have got infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus in the first wave of infections, according to the largest seroprevalence study in the region.
The study, published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal Wednesday, revealed that an estimated 4.3 million (or 43 lakh) people across 18 cities in Iran were most probably infected by the virus by April end.
However, till November, only 8,00,000 cases were confirmed in Iran.
Seroprevalence describes the overall proportion of people with antibodies of a virus in their blood. Seroprevalence surveys give an estimate of the true rate of infection and may also indicate the portion of the population that could be immune to the virus.
A study tracking seroprevalence across Iran suggests that the number of people who have had the SARS-CoV-2 virus is 17.1% overall and 20.0% in high-risk occupations. The findings suggest that an estimated almost 4.3 million people across the 18 cities sampled were infected with the virus by the end of April 2020, compared with 800,000 clinically confirmed cases by November 2020 for the whole country (population 81.8 million). This discrepancy may reflect the fact that clinical cases pick up only the severe end of the disease spectrum, especially in the first wave when widespread testing was less common.
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
This is the first major seroprevalence study from the Middle East and is published in
Seroprevalence study finds number of people infected with SARS-CoV-2 in Iran may be higher than expected medicalxpress.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from medicalxpress.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.