His wife was curious.
And Corby Renard was, too: Had anyone in his family had the coronavirus and didn’t know it?
Everyone already knew he’d had it.
Earlier this spring, the 52-year-old spent 14 days in the hospital, six of them on a ventilator, surrounded by health care workers in hazmat suits with his family quarantined at home.
The father of five was Lincoln’s first case of community-spread COVID-19 and, long before that Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department announcement, long before he’d arrived at CHI St. Elizabeth’s emergency room on a late March Saturday, he’d been home, not sure what had laid him low but sicker than he’d ever been.
He’d exposed his family, even sleeping in an extra bed in one of his son’s rooms for part of his illness.
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This column originally ran on April 8, 2020.
“My wife’s a health care worker,†Renard said Tuesday. “She wondered if maybe she had picked it up from me or someone at work and didn’t know it.â€
She wondered about their three sons and two daughters and about her mom, who helped out with the kids.
So they set up appointments for antibody testing at their doctor’s office in west Lincoln. Three of the Renards’ five children ended up testing positive for antibodies. A son, a daughter, his wife and mother-in-law all tested negative.
“We weren’t really surprised because we know it’s pretty rare for only one person in the household to get it,†he said. “But it was kind of a roulette.â€
As epidemiologists have learned more about how COVID-19 spreads, they’ve discovered that up to 50% of people with the virus are asymptomatic or experience symptoms so mild they brush it off as a cold or allergies.
Renard said they chose a test from a large national company with the advice of their doctor.
“I know there are issues with them. Our doctor said it was one of the more reliable ones.â€
Renard was the only member of his family not to be tested for antibodies.
He didn’t see the point, he said. Except to “test the test.â€
They are already doing that at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha.
Steve Hinrichs, director of the Nebraska Public Health Laboratory and chair of UNMC’s Department of Pathology and Microbiology, is part of that effort.
Antibody testing can show whether someone has had COVID-19, he said.
“Other than that, we don’t know what else the antibody information is telling us. We would like to know if they would be protected from the virus; that’s what we are doing with our research.â€
That research has looked at first responders and health care workers to find out if they developed antibodies, even with protective gear, Hinrichs said.
The good news? The number of positive antibody tests was “quite low,†Hinrichs said. Meaning the protection did its job.
In a household like the Renards’ — where only half the family tested positive with no safeguards — test results could mean one of two things, Hinrichs said.
“Does that mean the virus is not as contagious as we thought? Or are the antibody tests not as accurate as we hoped?â€
Nebraska Medicine’s antibody research is looking at the three parts of the virus — there are nine parts — where they have determined the presence of antibodies being made to fight it.
That research will guide the most effective makeup of a vaccine, Hinrichs said. (It could also point to tests that are not recognizing all of the COVID-19 antibody varieties present in the body.)
Answers are in the works.
“But we don’t want people to think, ‘I have antibodies. I don’t have to be careful at this point.’â€
The Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department is not recommending widespread antibody testing at this point, either, said Tim Timmons, communicable disease program supervisor.
“We recommend that people who have had close contact with someone who has the virus be tested for the virus.â€
It would be ideal if the presence of antibodies offered long-term protection, he said.
“Down the road, we may get some answers to that.â€
The antibody-positive children in the Renard household didn’t show symptoms that led them to think they had COVID-19.
Looking back, there were short-lived sore throats, a spell of dizziness, a severe asthma attack for one of the boys, the day a daughter lost her sense of smell.
“But it was allergy season, so who knows?†Renard said.
The teenagers took the positive antibody results as a sign they could flee the house, but the family is still being cautious. They are social distancing. Wary of large indoor gatherings.
They’ve shared the antibody news with their friends and colleagues — Renard is a homebuilder who recently took a job with the Lincoln Housing Authority — and most people know the story of Renard’s serious bout with the virus.
“Of course, everybody you talk to says they had it,†said the recovered patient, who is nearly back to his old self. “It’s unbelievable the amount of people who say they’re sure they did.â€
Up in the research lab in Omaha, that’s one thing Hinrichs can confirm.
“People are calling all the time, saying, ‘I was sick as a dog back in January, can I get a test to see if I had COVID?’â€
The answer is maybe so.
But even if the test is positive, it’s too soon to throw a party to celebrate.
Photos: Lincoln during the pandemic
Reach the writer at 402-473-7218 or clangekubick@journalstar.com.
On Twitter @TheRealCLK
In this Series
Milestones in Nebraska's coronavirus fight
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Updated
Governor to require hospitals to keep beds open for COVID patients, further restricts large gatherings
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Updated
COVID-19 death count climbs in Lancaster County following surge in recent cases
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Updated
Positive cases in LPS schools pass 200 — including 10 in one elementary — but officials say no school spread
- 123 updates