As they breathe out and you breathe in, some of their viral particles become attached to cells lining your nose and upper airways, and begin to gain entry. There is scientific consensus, however, says Barczak, that “it’s very unusual for people to stay infectious after ten days,” as they don’t tend to shed culturable virus.You sit next to someone who is infected with coronavirus. Indeed, as of guidance last updated on, the World Health Organization (WHO) still advises that people isolate for ten days after their symptoms start (or from when they are diagnosed if they are asymptomatic) plus three days after symptoms cease. ” Barczak’s research indicates that 25% of people who were infected with the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 could still be infectious after eight days. Some of these changes in guidance may be more to do with politics and shifting societal sentiments rather than science, suggest some researchers.Īmy Barczak, an infectious-disease specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, told Nature that “There is not data to support five days or anything shorter than ten days. However, just because recommendations on isolation after becoming infected with COVID-19 have become voluntary rather than mandatory, and many governments have cut the isolation period after infection from ten to five days, it doesn’t mean that the virus has changed its behaviour or that the science supports only isolating for five days if you are still testing positive. This is because a test’s detection of viral proteins indicates that the virus is replicating and producing more of its core material. Regardless, testing positive on a protein-based antigen test is a sign that one might be infectious. However, since people can be reinfected by SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, it is possible that positive test results over a long period of time can reflect multiple infections. Some people can test positive for COVID-19 for weeks or even months on PCR tests, but there is good news: people are not likely to be contagious for that long from a single infection, even if they test positive, and therefore are unlikely to transmit the virus to others.
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