Based on the latest report from Iceland’s mass testing, they found out that half of the positive cases show no symptoms. Read the main highlights from the news below!

Iceland’s mass testing reports half of Coronavirus case show no symptoms. 

As the Covid-19 continues to spread globally, every data comes from research plays an important role in the fight against the deadly pandemic. Furthermore, many significant findings on the contagious disease now come from a surprising location: Iceland. With a small population of 364,000, its authorities manage to test a large number of citizen without needing any lockdown. 

By last Sunday, Iceland’s health authorities and the biotechnology firm name deCode Genetics reported that they have been able to test nearly 10,300 people. While this number can’t compare to other countries, this is a much higher percentage of tests for each capital. Notably, a ratio of Icelandic authorities even stated that this number could be the highest one in the world.  

Asides the number above, there is also an unusual factor about Iceland’s approach. While in countries, people usually get tested if they show symptoms; Iceland chooses to test their citizen from the general public without any symptoms. By doing this, they hope to help discover more details on the nature of the pathogen. This week, they announced that the action results in finding crucial data: half of the tested cases had no coronavirus symptoms. This confirms another point raised by various research that stated covid-19 can spread more through people with that have no sign of being sick.

A big help

The high number of tested cases also involves genetic sequencing of the different samples of the virus. As a result, it helps researchers to review the various mutations of the coronavirus. So far, they have found at least 40 mutations of the virus in the country. Plus, the virus might progress to become more infectious, but less critical.