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In a dense field, the incubation period of the new coronavirus is one of its most elusive characteristics.
Carriers have been theorized to shed the most viral debris–and are, therefore, the most contagious, before the onset of symptoms. Unfortunately, there are many factors that determine the risk of an infected person to the public.
Some of these were recently explored in a study published in The Lancet Microbe, diary.
The authors found that patients are generally the most contagious between day one and day five after symptoms begin.. This was found to be true even among those who contracted mild manifestations of COVID-19. Additionally, none of the study samples featured in the report revealed viral material nine days after symptoms developed.
“The kinetics of viral load and the duration of viral shedding are important determinants for disease transmission. Our objective was to characterize the dynamics of viral load, the duration of viral RNA shedding and shedding of the viable severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) virus in various body fluids, and to compare SARS-CoV -2, SARS-CoV, and the viral dynamics of the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV), ”the authors wrote. We investigated three things: viral load (how the amount of virus in the body changes throughout infection), viral shedding (how long someone sheds viral genetic material, which does not necessarily mean that a person is infectious), and isolation of the live virus (a better indicator of a person’s infectivity, since the live virus is isolated and tested to see if it can replicate in the laboratory) ”
According to the authors, the viral load peaks in the throat and nose of most infected carriers.
The follow-up meta-analysis confirmed the projections indexed above. An independent contact tracing study conducted in Taiwan and another conducted in the UK concluded that the vast majority of samples became infected when exposed to an infected person within five days of the onset of symptoms.
Because early viral load peaks so early during infection, the authors urge those experiencing the instructional symptoms of COVID-19 to isolate themselves as soon as symptoms begin without waiting for test results.
“Although some people, especially those with serious illnesses or a weakened immune system (for example, due to chemotherapy), may have a longer viral shed, the results suggest that people infected with SARS-CoV-2 are more likely to to be highly infectious within a few days. before symptoms start and for the next five days, ”the authors concluded.
