Raemon comments on What is the typical course of COVID-19? What are the variants?

[Raemon]

Thanks!

I found this slightly hard to parse (for the reasons I find academic papers generally hard to parse), and have re-written it here to be slightly easier for me:

For example, on the clinical course of the disease, it has this: https://​​www.cdc.gov/​​coronavirus/​​2019-ncov/​​hcp/​​clinical-guidance-management-patients.html#clinical-course

Clinical presentation among reported cases of COVID-19 varies in severity from asymptomatic infection to mild illness to severe or fatal illness.

Some reports suggest the potential for clinical deterioration during the second week of illness. In one report, among patients with confirmed COVID-19 and pneumonia, just over half of patients developed dyspnea a median of 8 days after illness onset (range: 5–13 days).

In another report, the mean time from illness onset to hospital admission with pneumonia was 9 days. Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) developed in 17–29% of hospitalized patients, and secondary infection developed in 10%. In one report, the median time from symptom onset to ARDS was 8 days.

For information about when someone is infectious, https://​​www.cdc.gov/​​coronavirus/​​2019-ncov/​​hcp/​​faq.html, it says

The onset and duration of viral shedding and period of infectiousness for COVID-19 are not yet known.

It is possible that SARS-CoV-2 RNA may be detectable in the upper or lower respiratory tract for weeks after illness onset, similar to infection with MERS-CoV and SARS-CoV. However, detection of viral RNA does not necessarily mean that infectious virus is present.

Asymptomatic infection with SARS-CoV-2 has been reported, but it is not yet known what role asymptomatic infection plays in transmission. Similarly, the role of pre-symptomatic transmission (infection detection during the incubation period prior to illness onset) is unknown. Existing literature regarding SARS-CoV-2 and other coronaviruses (e.g. MERS-CoV, SARS-CoV) suggest that the incubation period may range from 2–14 days.