Prevalence of neutralizing antibody to human coronavirus 229E in Taiwan

Background: Four members in the Coronaviruses family including 229E circulating in the community were known to cause mild respiratory tract infections in humans. The epidemiologic information of the seasonal human coronavirus (HCoV) may help gain insight into the development of the ongoing pandemic of coronavirus disease since 2019 (COVID-19). Methods Plasma collection containing 1558 samples was obtained in 2010 for an estimate of the prevalence and severity of 2009 pandemic influenza A H1N1 in Taiwan. Of 1558 samples, 200 were randomly selected from those aged 60 years. The neutralizing antibody titers to HCoV-229E were determined in the serums using live virus ATCC VR_740TM cultivating in the Huh_ 7 cell line. Results Seroconversion of HCoV-229E (titer ≥ 1:2) was identified as early as less than 5 years of age. Among 140 subjects aged younger than or equal to 40 years, all of them had uniformly low titers ( 0.1). For 60 subjects greater than 40 years old, a majority (39, 65%) of them had high titers ≥ 1:10 and the GMTs were significantly increased with advanced age (P < 0.0001). Age was the most significant factor predicting seropositivity in the multivariate analysis, with an adjusted odds ratio of 1.107 and a 95% adjusted confidence interval of 1.061-1.155 (P < 0.0001). Conclusion HCoV-229E infection occurred as early as younger than 5 years old in Taiwanese and the magnitudes of neutralizing titers against HCoV-229E increased with advanced age beyond 40 years.