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. 2022 Nov 18;19(22):15257.
doi: 10.3390/ijerph192215257.

Eight Months of Serological Follow-Up of Anti-SARS-CoV-2 Antibodies in France: A Study among an Adult Population

Dorine Decarreaux  1   2   3 , Julie Sevila  1 , Shirley Masse  1 , Lisandru Capai  1 , Toscane Fourié  3 , Paola Mariela Saba Villarroel  3 , Abdennour Amroun  3 , Elif Nurtop  3 , Matthieu Vareille  1 , Thierry Blanchon  2 , Xavier de Lamballerie  3 , Remi Charrel  3 , Alessandra Falchi  1
Affiliations

Eight Months of Serological Follow-Up of Anti-SARS-CoV-2 Antibodies in France: A Study among an Adult Population

Dorine Decarreaux et al. Int J Environ Res Public Health. .

Abstract

Background: Uncertainties remain regarding the nature and durability of the humoral immune response to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2).

Aim: This study investigated immunoglobulin G response and neutralizing activity to evaluate the mean antibody concentrations and response duration induced by each vaccination regimen in a French adult population.

Methods: A study including blood sampling and questionnaires was carried out from November 2020 to July 2021 with three separate follow-up phases. Spike proteins and neutralizing antibodies were quantified using ELISA and a virus-neutralization test.

Results: Overall, 295 participants were included. Seroprevalences were 11.5% (n = 34), 10.5% (n = 31), and 68.1% (n = 201) in phases 1, 2, and 3, respectively. Importantly, 5.8% (n = 17) of participants lost their natural antibodies. Antibody response of participants with only a prior infection was 88.2 BAU/mL, significantly lower than those vaccinated, which was 1909.3 BAU/mL (p = 0.04). Moreover, the antibody response of vaccinated participants with a prior infection was higher (3593.8 BAU/mL) than those vaccinated without prior infection (3402.9 BAU/mL) (p = 0.78). Vaccinated participants with or without prior infection had a higher seroneutralization rate (91.0%) than those unvaccinated with prior infection (65.0%).

Conclusion: These results demonstrated that single infection does not confer effective protection against SARS-CoV-2.

Keywords: COVID-19; antibodies; long-lasting immunity; seroconversion; vaccination.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Timeline of the French COVID-19 epidemic during the study period.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Flowchart of the study population.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Levels of the IgG antibodies (BAU/mL) against the SARS-CoV-2 S protein by participants’ immune status according to (a) phase 1; (b) phase 2; (c) phase 3 of the study. The line in the center of the box depicts the median; the lower and upper hinges correspond to the first and third quartiles; and the distance between the first and third quartiles corresponds to the interquartile range.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Levels of the IgG antibodies (BAU/mL) of participants with a quantitative ELISA-S result at the time of phase 3 according to their number of COVID-19 vaccine doses.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Boxplot of the quantitative ELISA-S results according to neutralizing antibody titers among the participants.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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