Sailors aboard Roosevelt carrier retest positive for Covid-19 a 2nd time

sfchronicle.com

6 pointsburlesona3 comments

The sailors tested positive, but were asymptomatic. They quarantined for 14 days. They tested negative twice, 48 hours apart. Then sometime later (the article doesn’t say when), they become symptomatic and test positive again.

This is discouraging to see. What is the most likely explanation? The incubation time is much longer than we think? Maybe the first tests were false positives?

Has anyone else seen other cases like this? What is the leading hypothesis right now?

Based on studies in South Korea, it's because the first tests are false positive, so "asymptomatic" really means "not infected" the first time. In cases in South Korea where they were hospitalized, and then retest positive, it's because the second tests were false positive. So far no cases of getting truly sick again after resolving the first time (once they get to the bottom of initial/subsequent false positives).

It's not a second infection, it's just epithelial cells turning over in the lungs, releasing just enough viral RNA to amplify into a positive test result: http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20200429000724

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