Timing of antiviral treatment initiation is critical to reduce SARS-Cov-2 viral load

Antonio Gonçalves; Julie Bertrand; Ruian Ke; Emmanuelle Comets; Xavier de Lamballerie; Denis Malvy; Andrés Pizzorno; Olivier Terrier; Manuel Rosa Calatrava; France Mentré; Patrick Smith; Alan S Perelson; Jérémie Guedj

The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not peer-reviewed) is the . https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.04.04.20047886 doi: medRxiv preprint 24). Viral loads in nasopharyngeal swabs were measured by real time reverse transcriptase 77 polymerase chain reaction (RT PCR, lower limit of quantification: 38 cycles, CT) at multiple 78 time points with an observed peak of viral load at day 5 post onset of symptoms (range: 2-27 79 days). Data presented in CT were transformed to log10 copies/mL using a published 80 relationship in Zou et al. [4] and the model was fit to the log10 viral load. Of note, the 81 transformation from CT to log 10 copies/mL does not affect the estimates of parameters of 82 interest, in particular R 0 and the death rate of productively infected cells. Time since infection 83 was assumed to be 5 days before the onset of symptoms [5] . In a sensitivity analysis, we also 84 examined values of 2 and 10 days. 85