Clinical latency

Clinical latency is the state, or time period, in which an infectious agent such as a virus or bacterium replicates in its host without causing medical signs in the host. Each infectious agent has a characteristic duration of clinical latency, lasting from hours to years. The study of clinical latency is central to the epidemiology and treatment of many infectious diseases.

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With respect to viral infections, in clinical latency the virus is actively replicating.^[1] This is in contrast to viral latency, a form of dormancy in which the virus does not replicate.

Clinical latency occurs in:

• AIDS: persons infected with HIV may at first have no symptoms and show no signs of AIDS, despite HIV replicating in the lymphatic system and rapidly accumulating a large viral load. These persons may be infectious.
• syphilis
• Mycobacterium tuberculosis

During clinical latency, an infection is subclinical.

References

1. ^ Sharara AI (1997). "Chronic hepatitis C". South. Med. J. 90 (9): 872–7. PMID 9305294.

See also

• Incubation period