Every day, Le Parisien takes action to answer your questions about the coronavirus. Today we are interested in the questioning of Christine, who wonders if a person can be contagious during the incubation period.
The answer is yes, without nuance or detour. "During this period, the subject can be contagious: he can carry the virus before the appearance of symptoms or weak signals," said the Ministry of Health.
This period corresponds to the time between contamination and the appearance of the first symptoms (fever, cough, difficulty breathing, etc.). It usually lasts a few days but can reach two weeks. This is the reason why a "quarantine" of at least 15 days is necessary to prevent any contamination.
In very rare cases, this incubation period may be a little longer. According to a study published two weeks ago in the journal Annals of internal medicine, the symptoms appear after 40 days for around 100 people in 10,000, or about 1% of cases.
This contagiousness during the incubation period is one of the reasons explaining the extent of the spread of SARS-CoV-2 compared to other coronaviruses. "The SARS coronavirus ( appeared in China in 2002, editor's note ) was contagious only a few days after the onset of symptoms, which left time to diagnose and isolate the patients before they infected other people , explained to the Senate last month Arnaud Fontanet, epidemiologist at the Pasteur Institute. All the patients had severe forms so they were all identified, we did not miss benign forms which could have been unnoticed. "
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You can ask us all your questions about coronavirus by filling out our form or directly at coronavirus@leparisien.fr. Find all the answers previously published on our dedicated page.
