This is fascinating, awesome, and – if I’m being honest – a little hope-inspiring. These kinds of massive antibody tests are necessary for the whole country to move forward in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, so the fact that MLB and its players and employees are playing a small part in the process is pretty great.
The breaking news from Jeff Passan:
Worth noting: The antibody test, which detects whether a person contracted coronavirus regardless of symptoms, is not taking away the ability to be tested for the disease from the sick or healthcare workers. This is a test typically used for research and epidemiological purposes.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) April 14, 2020
MLB was among a number of companies considered for the testing, researchers said. They targeted large companies with employees in multiple metropolitan areas. As the paper written on the study is peer reviewed, researchers expect it to include an accounting of the sample.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) April 14, 2020
There are only so many widespread national industries where you could get so many people involved (who’ve had contact with lots of different folks over the past few months) in such a quick turnaround, so MLB actually makes a ton of sense to be involved in this study. Hence why they were approached to participate.
“This is the first study of national scope where we’re going to get a read on a large number of communities throughout the United States to understand how extensive the spread of the virus has been,” said Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of medicine at Stanford University who will assess the data gathered this week and write a peer-reviewed paper he hopes to publish as early as next week. “This will be the very first of those. Why MLB versus other employers? I’ve reached out to others, but MLB moved by far the fastest. They’ve been enormously cooperative and flexible. We’re trying to set up a scientific study that would normally take years to set up, and it’s going to be a matter of weeks.”
As Passan notes, there’s no specific upside here for MLB or its players, other than just being in a position to help public health policy at a national level. When you can help by doing a simple pinprick blood test, you do it. I love to see this. I also love to know that we’ve reached the point where a massive national antibody test is ready to be studied.