Testing Positive (but not infectious) a whole after first test...

[Velvetpeel]

So I’ve read that you can test positive for up to 3 months after your initial test but not be infectious.
I was wondering if this why there are a lot of ‘a symptomatic’ cases? Because they had some symptoms (not the main 3) in the last 3 months and so when they are tested there’s no symptoms at all but actually when they had the active infection they had some milder symptoms?
Also wondered if this is why people say they tested positive but didn’t pass it on to anyone they had close contact with in the typical infection window?
Hope that makes sense?!

*title should say while not whole

Just me then

Yes it might be. But difficult to know how much of a difference this is actually making in practice. For a start I think the length of time that you shed the virus for is linked to the severity of the illness and while it can be up to 90 days I think it's typically a lot less than that.

In terms of asymptomatic positives, it's worth bearing in mind that some of those will end up being pre-symptomatic. There were quite a few papers at the start of the pandemic that recorded x% of people being asymptomatic at the point of testing which ended up being reported as being asymptomatic in the media. I think following those up showed the majority of those cases ended up as symptomatic they were just tested early enough that they weren't yet showing symptoms.

I think if you get a positive from one of the lateral flow tests you then have to have a PCR test. In theory that might sort out the two groups. Those in the early stages of infection should end up with a strong positive from a second test. If you are just shedding inactive virus particles from a previous infection you'll probably get a weak positive.