Don't panic
Is it necessary to avoid those who have been ill with COVID-19 for 90 days?
Andrey Ukrainsky, Mednovosti
Today, the head of Rospotrebnadzor, Anna Popova, made a public statement that a person can secrete the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus for 90 days. Popova said that at the same time, the virus carrier may not have any symptoms. But she did not specify how dangerous it is for others. We will try to figure out how to treat this statement.
What can the detection of a virus mean
To diagnose COVID-19, the PCR method is used, which shows whether there is RNA of the virus in the test material. What can the detection of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus RNA in the studied material mean, medical toxicologist, scientific journalist Alexey Vodovozov told the medical portal:
"This is possible with several options. For example, a patient does have a virus. The specificity and sensitivity of modern tests is such that they catch a very small number of viruses. The second point is that PCR also reacts to "spare parts" of RNA, which may be from a "disassembled" virus. The immune system has "dismantled" it, but PCR can react to it, we can detect them in the analysis. This does not mean that a person is sick or even a virus carrier. That is, a positive PCR does not mean that a person is contagious."
Vodovozov added that it is still unknown what dose of the new coronavirus is infectious, sufficient to infect a person.
Asymptomatic carriers secrete the virus for months?
It is uncomfortable to imagine that people without symptoms want to be around us, but each of them can spread the coronavirus for 90 days. Alexey Vodovozov commented on this situation for the medical portal as follows:
"The point of this story with healthy secretions is that they are not dangerous to others, and if the production of the virus increases in the nasopharynx or somewhere else, then it's not for long, it's a very short period. We don't know exactly which one yet."
How long has a person been infected with covid-19
There are studies in which scientists compare how long a person secretes virus RNA, and how many days these viruses are viable. For example, a patient with a mild course of COVID-19 who isolated coronavirus RNA for 63 days after the day of the onset of symptoms of the disease is described. But in the laboratory, the virus culture could be obtained only from the secretions of the first 18 days. However, this does not mean that the patient was infected during these 18 days. According to current ideas, usually a person is contagious for a much shorter period.
According to an analysis published by WHO in June, after the 9th day of illness, patients very rarely secrete viruses that can form a culture, that is, viable. Similar information is provided by the American Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC): the patient rarely remains contagious for more than 10 days. The same CDC document also includes a period of 90 days. It is indicated that if a person continues to secrete coronavirus RNA (it is not talking about a live virus) for 90 days, then this is most likely not a repeat infection, but traces of a disease suffered in the past.
Conclusion
Thus, Anna Popova's statement should be treated calmly. A person can indeed secrete coronavirus RNA for up to 90 days. But there is no reason to believe that such a long isolation is dangerous for others.
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