Department of Molecular and Developmental Medicine, University of Siena, Siena, Italy.
VisMederi srl, Siena, Italy.
Hum Vaccin Immunother. 2022 Nov 30;18(5):2047582. doi: 10.1080/21645515.2022.2047582. Epub 2022 Mar 15.
In March 2020, the first pandemic caused by a coronavirus was declared by the World Health Organization. Italy was one of the first and most severely affected countries, particularly the northern part of the country. The latest evidence suggests that the virus could have been circulating, at least in Italy, before the first autochthonous SARS-COV-2 case was detected in February 2020. The present study aimed to investigate the presence of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 in human serum samples collected in the last months of 2019 (September-December) in the Apulia region, Southern Italy. Eight of 455 samples tested proved positive on in-house receptor-binding-domain-based ELISA. Given the month of collection of the positive samples, these findings may indicate early circulation of SARS-CoV-2 in Apulia region in the autumn of 2019. However, it cannot be completely ruled out that the observed sero-reactivity could be an unknown antigen specificity in another virus to which subjects were exposed containing an epitope adventitiously cross-reactive with an epitope of SARS-CoV-2.
2020 年 3 月，世界卫生组织宣布爆发了首例由冠状病毒引起的大流行。意大利是首批受影响最严重的国家之一，尤其是该国北部地区。最新证据表明，在 2020 年 2 月首次发现本地传播的 SARS-CoV-2 病例之前，该病毒可能已经在意大利传播。本研究旨在调查意大利南部普利亚地区 2019 年最后几个月（9 月至 12 月）采集的人血清样本中是否存在针对 SARS-CoV-2 的抗体。在 455 个测试样本中，有 8 个样本在内部受体结合域 ELISA 中呈阳性。鉴于阳性样本的采集月份，这些发现可能表明 2019 年秋季 SARS-CoV-2 在普利亚地区的早期传播。然而，不能完全排除观察到的血清学反应可能是另一种未知的病毒抗原特异性，即接触者接触的另一种病毒中含有与 SARS-CoV-2 表位偶然发生交叉反应的表位。
