Health Secretary Matt Hancock revealed the study's findings at Thursday's Downing Street press briefing
Research carried out by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) uses swab testing to determine how many people are infected with Covid-19 across the country at any one time.
In the vast majority of cases, those who tested positive had not been displaying any symptoms, Matt Hancock revealed on Thursday.
The Health Secretary told the daily Downing Street press briefing: "Yes, there are some people who don't have symptoms but do have the virus.
"And in fact, in the ONS study we find that around 70-80 per cent of people who test positive don't have symptoms. That is quite a significant finding."
Mr Hancock acknowledged that asymptomatic transmission is "one of the things that makes controlling this disease really hard."
© 10 Downing Street/AFP via GettyMatt Hancock
Dido Harding, who is heading up the NHS test-and-trace programme, said a rollout of antibody testing for the public would "come in time", with health care staff currently being tested.
Antibodies being present in a blood sample are a sign that someone has contracted the virus in the past.
But Baroness Harding said the issue was that not enough was known about what level of protection testing positive for coronavirus antibodies provided.
Earlier in the UK outbreak, there had initially been talk of immunity certificates being issued by the Government to allow those who had previously contracted the virus to be exempt from some lockdown measures.
All you need to know from the June 11 Covid-19 briefing
Lady Harding told the No 10 press conference: "One of the challenges, and I know we all want it to be true that if we have antibodies it will then mean we are free to do things others are not, but at the moment... if we have an antibody test what it tells you is you have antibodies.
"Over time we would expect that we would build up the evidence to demonstrate what proportion or level of antibodies you need to actually have immunity and for how long you would have immunity.
"But at the moment, the science isn't there.
"So I totally understand everyone's desire to know if that cough or temperature they had in February or March was in fact coronavirus but at the moment it won't tell you anything other than if you did or didn't have it."
Comment: Quite likely perhaps even earlier: French doctor claims coronavirus was present in Europe in December
She added: "It will come in time, and the testing we are doing, the antibody testing in health and care at the moment, is enabling us to build that scientific evidence base to the point at which then we will start to see the real benefit for all of us."
The latest figures from the ONS study suggest that one in every 1,000 people currently have coronavirus, with 53,000 people thought to be carrying it in England at present.
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from the article:
Up to 20 million polio survivors around the world face the threat of new disabilities 15 to 40 years after their original illness, which could leave them using wheelchairs or ventilators for the rest of their lives, says a new report from the March of Dimes.A major problem confronting millions of polio survivors is that too few doctors, in both industrial and developing countries, recognize this slow moving and little understood secondary illness, called post-polio syndrome (PPS). The main symptoms of PPS are new progressive muscle weakness that gradually worsens, together with severe fatigue and pain in muscles and joints. It is often accompanied by decreased muscle endurance during activities.
Is it possible that the elderly in northern Italy were survivors of a polio virus to a greater extent than other areas?
Study of post polio patients in northern Italy 2016
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