It is important to find people who have symptoms and test them on priority, says one of the authors
While both asymptomatic and symptomatic COVID-19 patients transmit infection, a study by a team of experts from Karnataka has found that the main driving force behind the spread in the State during the lockdown were symptomatic people.
The team of experts led by V. Ravi, senior professor and Head of Neuro Virology at NIMHANS, who is also part of the State’s COVID-19 task force, studied 3,404 cases reported from March 8 (when the first case was detected) to May 31.
Of these, while 3,096 (91%) were asymptomatic, 308 (9%) were symptomatic. Majority of the asymptomatic cases were aged between 16 and 50 while symptomatic cases were aged between 31 and 65. Most of those affected were males.
“As per our analysis, on an average, each symptomatic patient has spread the infection to 7.1…