"Yes, Portugal is going to do serological studies to find out what proportion of its population has acquired immunity to this virus", said Graça Freitas at a press conference.

The Director-General of Health said that the National Institute of Health Doctor Ricardo Jorge, together with other countries, will proceed to immunity tests, with “how can these tests be done and when is the ideal time” being studied.

“Immunity is something that takes time to settle, that is, between the date of infection and the date when our body starts producing visible antibodies for a long time to wait. It seems like a long time ago, but the disease in Portugal started about a month ago ”, she said, stressing that most Portuguese patients are still in the recovery phase.

Graça Freitas explained that the Ricardo Jorge Institute, in collaboration with scientists, academics and DGS, will enter a pilot phase with other countries, to understand what is happening.

"We will have to understand the ideal time to do the test, because if it is too early, there may still be no antibodies and, therefore, we have to find the ideal date here", he said, stressing that the methodology and the date that the studies are going to be carried out "are now being considered by the international scientific community".

Graça Freitas also said that the studies will probably have to be repeated, "to see the duration of immunity".

“It is not enough to test it once, it is necessary to know whether this immunity is lasting or not. The history of this virus is very short, we have to wait for the time to pass to find out more ”, he said.

The new coronavirus, responsible for the covid-19 pandemic, has already infected more than 1.2 million people worldwide, of whom nearly 60,000 died.