The World Health Organization has tried to clarify its recent report on asymptomatic spread of the coronavirus, which said it is “very rare” and the rate of spread is unknown.
“The majority of transmission that we know about is that people who have symptoms transmit the virus to other people through infectious droplets,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO’s technical lead on the coronavirus pandemic, on Facebook Live Tuesday morning, according to STAT News. “But there are a subset of people who don’t develop symptoms, and to truly understand how many people don’t have symptoms, we don’t actually have that answer yet.”
She added, "We do know that some people who are asymptomatic or some people who don't have symptoms can transmit the virus on.”
Van Kerkhove pointed to her use of the phrase "very rare" as a reason for confusion, noting that it’s a “misunderstanding to state that asymptomatic transmission globally is very rare. What I was referring to is a subset of studies."
She said, "Some estimates of around 40% of transmission may be due to asymptomatic, but those are from models, and so I didn't include that in my answer yesterday but wanted to make sure that I covered that here.”
Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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