Jeannine Lee Lake, Democratic nominee for Indiana’s Sixth Congressional District challenging incumbent Republican Greg Pence, said she has tested positive for COVID-19 antibodies and will donate blood plasma next week to help doctors treat patients who are struggling to survive the virus.
Lake said she learned that she had tested positive for COVID-19 antibodies in late June.
However, Lake said she has been getting tested for an active COVID-19 infection every week since the beginning of June before attending any events, and the results have always come back negative.
In June, Lake attended a Juneteenth event at Donner Park that included a silent march in remembrance of George Floyd and other victims of police brutality.
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“That’s why I’m so adamant about testing and making sure that people are able to go in if they even have because if they bring it back to grandma or grandpa who get, they may not be as lucky as me,” Lake said. “…I was shocked when my doctor called me and said, ‘You had it.’”
A COVID-19 antibody test, also known as a serology test, aims to detect the presence of antibodies in the blood specific to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.
A positive test result is presumed to mean that a person was exposed to the virus at some point in the past and their immune system produced proteins called antibodies to fight it off. The tests are different from nasal swab tests and do not indicate whether a person is currently infected with the virus.
Lake said her doctor suspects she may have had a mild case of COVID-19 in April around the time when she was prescribed antibiotics for what appeared to be a “sinus infection that wouldn’t go away.”
However, health experts caution that it’s hard to say precisely when someone was infected with COVID-19 in the past, and the extent to which COVID-19 antibodies protect against catching the virus again is not yet known.
Currently, thousands of doctors across the country, including at Columbus Regional Health, are participating in national effort to transfuse antibodies from the plasma of COVID-19 survivors to treat patients currently struggling to fight off an infection.
The treatment, called convalescent plasma therapy, involves giving COVID-19 patients an infusion of blood plasma from people who have already recovered from the illness in hopes that antibodies produced by the recovered patient’s immune system will help other patients fight the infection
In April, CRH joined a national trial led by the Mayo Clinic to administer the treatment and partnered with blood research institute Versiti to supply donated plasma.
As of mid-July, CRH officials said they had administered the treatment to at least 54 patients.
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Columbus Regional Health is seeking potential donors for the Expanded Access Convalescent Plasma Program.
Potential donors who are eligible for the program will be able to donate at a Versiti Blood Bank location in Indianapolis, and their plasma will be used to treat patients in Bartholomew County and surrounding areas.
In order to donate, a person must be at least 18 years of age, weigh at least 110 pounds and meet the following additional requirements:
- Have had a confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 by physician and laboratory testing
- Must be symptom free for 28 days before being eligible to donate
- If symptom free for 14-27 days, a negative test must be verified
Anyone with questions about the donation process or the Expanded Access Convalescent Plasma Program is encouraged to visit: crh.org/plasma.
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