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As Above So Below
Can people spread coronavirus after they recover?
The new study, published in the journal JAMA on Thursday (Feb. 27), followed four medical professionals ages 30 to 36 years old who developed COVID-19 (the disease caused by the new coronavirus) and were treated at Wuhan University's Zhongnan Hospital in China between Jan. 1 and Feb. 15. All of the individuals recovered, and only one was hospitalized during the illness. The patients were treated with oseltamivir, better known under the brand name of Tamiflu, an antiviral drug.
The patients were considered recovered after their symptoms resolved and after they tested negative for COVID-19 twice (on two consecutive days). After recovery, the patients were asked to quarantine themselves at home for five days. They continued to undergo throat swabs for the coronavirus after five days for up to 13 days post-recovery.
The results showed that every test between Day 5 and Day 13 was positive for the virus.
"These findings suggest that at least a proportion of recovered patients still may be virus carriers," the researchers wrote.
The findings come as Japan reported its first case of an individual who recovered from coronavirus and then became ill with the disease for a second time, according to Reuters. Given the new results on post-coronavirus persistence from China, it's not clear what happened with the Japanese patient, Johnson said. One possibility is that she caught a new version of the virus from another person; another possibility is that her own system did not fight off the virus completely and as it began to replicate inside her lungs again, she experienced a resurgence of symptoms.
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