WHO official walks back comments on asymptomatic spread
An official leading the World Health Organization’s COVID-19 response clarified comments made at a media briefing Monday that suggested coronavirus transmission by asymptomatic individuals is “very rare.”
Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s technical lead, said in a video posted on the organization’s Twitter feed that she was referring to a small subset of studies and unpublished information from member states.
“I wasn’t stating a policy of WHO or anything like that, I was just trying to articulate what we know,” she said. “And in that I used the phrase ‘very rare,’ and I think that’s a misunderstanding to state that asymptomatic transmission globally is very rare.”
In contact tracing efforts from other countries, secondary transmission from asymptomatic individuals was rarely found, Kerkhove said, but the subject is still “a major unknown.”
She said models that attempt to estimate asymptomatic transmission vary greatly – some predict spread by people without symptoms may make up to 40% of transmissions.
Monday’s comments fueled tweets by anti-lockdown activists questioning the country’s decision to shutter businesses, leading to record unemployment and job loss.
“We shut our nation down, nearly destroyed the economy, and have people wearing masks for no reasons other than govt. control,” tweeted Newsmax TV host John Cardillo.
Kerkhove reiterated some of her points in Tuesday’s clarification video, including that some pre-symptomatic cases may have been misidentified as asymptomatic.
Other individuals, she said, may have been misidentified as asymptomatic because they didn’t present common COVID-19 symptoms such as fever, cough and shortness of breath, instead exhibiting much milder symptoms.
Kerkhove said much research is being done to determine when someone has COVID-19 and is truly asymptomatic and what proportion of that population actually transmits the disease.
“That’s a big open question, and that remains an open question,” she said.
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