#Some New Yorkers had the coronavirus in early February, new research shows

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Patients get tested for antibodies for COVID-19 in a drive-thru testing tent outside Delmont Medical Care in Franklin Square, New York.
Dennis A. Clark

The coronavirus appears to have been circulating at low levels in the Big Apple since early February — about a month before the first case was confirmed in the city, new research reveals.

A study published this week, based on more than 5,000 plasma samples collected from patients at Manhattan’s Mount Sinai Hospital, revealed that some patients had antibodies for the contagion as early as the week ending on Feb. 23.

Considering the time necessary to produce antibodies, that likely means they were infected about two weeks earlier, Florian Krammer, an immunologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, who led the study, told the New York Times.

“You’re probably talking about very early in February,” Krammer said. “It looks like there was at least low-level circulation.”

The research has yet to be peer-reviewed, but several experts backed its credibility, according to the Times.

Trevor Bedford, an evolutionary biologist at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, said it appears that Feb. 19 was “the arrival that fueled things,” but noted that “it’s cool that we all have similar numbers.”

The first confirmed coronavirus case in the city occurred in a woman in her late 30s who had recently traveled to Iran.

Blood plasma samples used in the Mount Sinai study came from two separate groups: patients who visited the hospital’s emergency department, and those who underwent regular screenings as part of obstetric care, regular office and treatment visits, and elective or planned surgeries, among other types of care, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The samples were collected beginning the week of Feb. 9.

Researchers said they saw a “stark increase” in samples positive for antibodies within the emergency department group beginning the week ending March 22.

In the screening group, that increase was spotted a week later.

The researchers also found that, by the week ending April 9, an estimated 1.62 million individuals in the city had been infected with the virus that causes COVID-19, according to the Journal.

However, they said the samples aren’t representative of the entire population.

But similar findings released by state officials in an April study indicated that one in five Big Apple residents screened in the state’s first round of coronavirus antibody testing were exposed to the contagion.