People with swine flu seem to remain contagious for twice as long as people infected with a seasonal flu.
According to an initial study, the results of which were announced at the annual Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy in September in San Francisco, one in five people with the swine flu would still carry live virus particles for at least eight days after the onset of symptoms. carry.
According to a second study, eighty percent of people still secrete virus particles after five days of illness and ten percent even until ten days later. In one patient, even twelve days after the onset of symptoms virus particles found. And that despite treatment with Tamiflu.
However, this second study did not verify whether the flu virus found was still alive † This is important, because current techniques are so sensitive that they can also detect viruses long after they have died.
