What a fiasco
One of the reasons the bulls got so excited yesterday about the reopening trade was a comment from Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, head of WHO’s emerging diseases and zoonosis unit.
She said “it’s very rare” to get asymptomatic transmission of coronavirus.
“From the data we have, it still seems to be rare that an asymptomatic person actually transmits onward to a secondary individual,” she said. “We have a number of reports from countries who are doing very detailed contact tracing … They’re following asymptomatic cases. They’re following contacts. And they’re not finding secondary transmission onward. It’s very rare.”
Today, the WHO is walking that back.
Officials say that they estimate that 16% of people who are asymptomatic can spread that virus and that it could be as high as 40%. They also said they regret that the comment that it’s “very rare”.