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Post by GamGam on Mar 13, 2020 21:46:39 GMT
Short question: How long is a person a carrier of the virus? We know of a Priest who went to a conference in February in Louisville, KY. He became sick after returning home, and was hospitalized for pneumonia. He recovered— mostly at home, and is healthy now. But after the outbreak of the virus, he decided to be tested, and he tested positive for COVID-19. So my question is this: how long is the virus alive in his body, and for how long is he a carrier of the disease? He had no idea that he had been around a person who was a carrier of the virus. Once you have the disease, do you carry the virus forever?
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Post by sabrinae on Mar 13, 2020 21:55:05 GMT
Short answer is that no one knows at this point. The incubation period is anywhere from 5-25 days. No one knows how long bird shedding continues after illness.
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RedSquirrelUK
Drama Llama

Posts: 7,077
Location: The UK's beautiful West Country
Aug 2, 2014 13:03:45 GMT
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Post by RedSquirrelUK on Mar 13, 2020 22:05:16 GMT
As it's a brand new (that's where the "novel" part of the name comes from) virus, I don't think anybody really knows yet. There have been a handful of people who have recovered and then tested positive again, and it intrigues me too.
Typically, viruses will stay in the body forever, which is how we get shingles from the chicken pox virus, and why once we get a cold sore for the first time, we will be forever prone to them. The coronaviruses, of which the common cold is one, tend to mutate every few months. That's how we can get colds a few times a year if our immune systems are low. If COVID-19 behaves like that, then we could very well catch it more than once as it mutates - a scary thought indeed, because then it could really weed out the weak over and over again. But it hasn't been around long enough yet for us to know.
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