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NBA Bubble Provided Perfect Petri Dish For Studying COVID-19 Spread

By Nicholas Gerbis
Published: Wednesday, July 7, 2021 - 12:56pm
Updated: Thursday, July 8, 2021 - 7:42am
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As the Suns vie for the NBA championship, some researchers are using last season’s bubble to better understand how coronavirus spreads — and to find out how well Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines worked.

How long is someone able to infect others after they develop COVID-19 symptoms or test positive for the virus?

Since February, the CDC has said 10 days is a safe self-isolation period for people with no symptoms, but tests for viral RNA can still come back positive weeks later. 

Fortunately, when the NBA established its Orlando bubble last year, it created a kind of petri dish ideally suited for tracking symptoms and transmission among people undergoing daily tests and frequent physical contact.

The JAMA Internal Medicine paper found no transmission among the roughly 4,000 players and personnel studied, suggesting CDC's 10-day guidelines are sufficient to stop spread.

Coronavirus Science Health + Medicine