Recovering from COVID-19 can be a long and difficult process, and it's important to understand what life is like after recovering from the virus. The amount of time it takes for a person to stop being contagious varies depending on the immunosuppressed state and the severity of the disease. According to a recent study, large numbers of people with COVID-19 are likely to continue to be contagious after the first five days of their illness, even if they feel fully recovered. Dr.
Joshua Septimus, associate professor of clinical medicine and medical director of Houston Methodist Primary Care Group Same Day Clinics, explains that the infectious period varies from person to person. Most people with COVID-19 will have a mild illness and recover within a few days. To help determine when someone is no longer contagious, a symptom-based strategy is used. This process considers patients with confirmed COVID-19 as non-contagious and exempts them from isolation or other transmission-based precautions when certain criteria are met.
The criteria for exemption from isolation include the length of time since initial diagnosis (onset of symptoms or positive test) in combination with resolution of fever for at least 24 hours (without using any fever-reducing agent) and improvement of symptoms related to COVID-19. For asymptomatic individuals, elimination of isolation is only based on the time elapsed since the initial positive test. According to the CDC, symptoms of COVID can appear between two and 14 days after a person is exposed to the virus.
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