What are my chance of getting Covid?

November 3, 2022 4:08 PM

My wife talked to a neighbor outside yesterday for 3 or 4 minutes. They were approx 5 feet apart and he was wearing a mask. His wife is now positive but he's not. Are the odds in my favor on this one? Also, any suggestions on not worrying obsessively about this are obciously welcomed. Thanks.
posted by captainscared to Health & Fitness (15 answers total)

I would be more worried about getting hit by lightning than I would be of catching COVID on those facts.
posted by Admiral Haddock at 4:10 PM on November 3, 2022 [56 favorites]

If he's not positive, then even if he has it (which he very well might not), the chance that he has a high enough viral load to be contagious is... not impossible, but very small. If they were outside, the chance of transmission (even if he has it which he very well might not) is not impossible, but very small. If he was masked, the chance that he could get someone else sick (if he has it which he very well might not) is not impossible, but very small. So I would say your chance is not impossible, but very very very small. Throw another "very" in there given that he very well might not have it at all.
posted by babelfish at 4:11 PM on November 3, 2022 [5 favorites]

I think it's more likely you've got covid right now from some other source than that you got covid as a result of this specific interaction.
posted by phunniemee at 4:17 PM on November 3, 2022 [46 favorites]

This is what the mask & the distancing were for. This is why we say to do it. Because of those things, it's very unlikely that enough particles reached her or you to make you sick. If there was no mask & no distance it might be different. Keep on keeping on!
posted by bleep at 4:22 PM on November 3, 2022 [10 favorites]

So the transmission route would be from a person
- outside, several feet away
- for a few minutes
- wearing a mask
- who is testing negative
- who gave it to your (vaccinated?) wife
- who then gave it to you unknowingly

My friend, this thing is contagious, yes, but I don't think we are at briefly-talking-to-people-five-feet-away-while-wearing-a-mask-with-an-undetectable-viral-load contagious.

Feel better in the next few days by doing this: eating your veggies, reducing sweets and alcohol, exercising in a way you enjoy, consuming pleasant media, avoiding doomscrolling, going outside, putting down your devices, taking a multivitamin every day or two, calling a friend who makes you laugh, petting a dog.
posted by bluedaisy at 4:24 PM on November 3, 2022 [9 favorites]

Best answer: I don't know if this is helpful, but I am incredibly COVID cautious (essentially housebound, I describe myself as an outdoor cat) and immunocompromised, and if I were in you or your wife's position I would not be worried myself. I've been in similar situations a few timed during the pandemic, where somebody that I was outside with briefly or even for a length of time ended up having COVID at the time we interacted, and in neither case was I particularly concerned and both times I did not get COVID. Being outside reduces the risk, having one or more masks in the equation reduces the risk, the length of time and distance you describe reduces the risk. This is the Swiss cheese model of disease prevention and you have a lot of things working in your favor in this particular situation.

For me, it was helpful to put together a little plan that outlines what to do if I am exposed to COVID or if I test positive myself. Having a plan in place means that I have a procedure to follow when a known exposure happens (which for me is testing on day 3 and 5 after exposure, or if I have symptoms). If I test positive for COVID, I have a handy dandy sheet of information that I compiled after speaking with my doctors that outlines who I need to call, what I need to ask for, and what I need to do. That way I can kind of rest easy and not spend a lot of time cycling around in my head trying to figure out what to do. The unfortunate reality is that limiting exposures is the best thing that we can do, preventing exposures entirely is really not possible, even if you live an incredibly sheltered life. Hate to serve a metafilter special and recommend therapy, but working on my grief about this and the way that it has changed my life in therapy has really helped me let go of some of the worry about exposure, for whatever that's worth.
posted by twelve cent archie at 4:27 PM on November 3, 2022 [17 favorites]

I'm also very covid cautious and would not worry about this.

If I were planning to see anyone particularly vulnerable in the next few days I'd make a point of telling them so they could make their own risk decisions about interacting with me, but I would not worry on my own account.
posted by Stacey at 4:35 PM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

You can always play with a tool like microcovid as well. For an outdoor conversation lasting 5 minutes, standing approximately 6 feet apart, choosing “has COVID” and “wearing a surgical mask” for your neighbor and no mask for your wife, and placing you in NYC, for instance, it spits out a .0072% probability that COVID was transmitted. Yes, there’s no real reliability to the math—none that you’d want to risk your life on in more critical decision-making scenarios— but relative to the risk this calculator assigns to other scenarios you can plug in, this is another affirmation, if you need it, that even if your neighbor was infected and actively infectious this is one of the lowest risk scenarios out there.
posted by blue suede stockings at 5:39 PM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

Outside in open air with a masked person testing negative for a short time at distance and you are the third party. Meh.

You're overthinking that anyone who has even seen a COVID is tainted and anybody who has seen them is therefore tainted and therefore you are tainted. And you even have that person is tested negative and the meeting was outdoors and it was short and he was wearing a mask.

You are like three degrees of separation from a possible source and the first degree person is negative and was taking precautions even before (and assuming still) and you're freaking out about your third degree maybe?

suggestions on not worrying obsessively about this are obciously welcomed. (post hoc (sic))
posted by zengargoyle at 6:22 PM on November 3, 2022 [7 favorites]

You and your wife are max-vaxxed?

I am COVID-conservative and my level of concern here would be minimum. Out of an abundance of caution I would not get close to anyone outside my house, but that is entirely in respect to a social contract I think is important but a lot of other people don't.

These circumstances were about as good as they can get: outdoors, distanced, one of them masked.

The odds are good the husband will eventually test positive, and might have enough viral load to test positive now on a PCR test or will soon. He may or may not disclose that if it happens. You may never know how it pans out for them. The families I know who've gotten it in the past two months have taken 6-8 days for each exposed person to trip a home test, which often means one kid brings it home from school, gets sick 3-5 days later but doesn't test positive (home antigen test) for several more days, and then everybody else goes down 3-5 days after them and doesn't test positive for several more days. It is not unreasonable to take the general precautions you can - avoid exertion, don't go visiting anybody, be mindful, coddle your immune system - get your sleep, eat a vegetable, don't go out and promptly get the flu or rsv. Worrying yourself into a frenzy will not help at this point, and in fact might make you more vulnerable.

I'm not saying you should be careful because you are definitely sick and the worst possible things are going to happen to you. But imagine you go see someone and 5 days later they call and say "well, I don't know if I exposed you but" and you WON'T have to think "shit, did I expose them??" It is relatively simple to control that kind of outcome assuming your work and other life necessities allow you to hunker down for a week and wait it out. Just to be sure.

My partner and I are even doing periodic outdoor activities in uncrowded areas, usually spacing them out by at least two weeks just in case. We went on a ghost walk on Halloween, feeling like the dilution of being outdoors and almost always moving meant very limited risk (and no, nobody but us wore masks which we expected, and I sometimes took mine off when we were spread out). We've been eating on patios (masked when not at our table/consuming things), and dipping into stores periodically when curbside pickup wasn't practical timing-wise, and we still haven't caught it despite almost assuredly crossing paths with SOMEBODY contagious every time we go out. I always assume I've gotten at least the exposure your wife did when we go anywhere, just to be mindful of what I do with myself after that, but my personal worry that I myself will get sick is low*.

And for the most part the science says that's about right - it should be relatively uncommon to get sick from that kind of brief exposure. Some people do though, and we don't yet know why - nobody can quite explain how, in some of these families I've known who got taken out by a kid in school, sometimes one or more people do not get sick even though the models say they absolutely should've and never test positive and nobody knows if they had a low-load asymptomatic case or just didn't get it somehow. Some of my friends' kids still haven't gotten it as far as anyone can tell, which may help you put into perspective that somewhat-mitigated exposure is NOT an automatic transmission, even repeatedly and at some length indoors with low mitigation-compliance.

*I have had one incident of pretty abruptly feeling shitty, which is the only time I've home-tested so far and yes, my worry level went up at that point even after testing negative, until I was far enough out from my last possible exposure that I could definitely say I was suffering from some stressful life events rather than any virus.
posted by Lyn Never at 7:05 PM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

For what it's worth, I recently had lunch at a crowded outdoor table with a coworker who popped positive about 18 hours later. He was sitting less than 3 ft from me for probably 30-45 min. I was pretty intimidated when I got the notification because that's pretty close, but I never got sick, felt sick, or tested positive. I'm fully vaxxed (including bivalent booster); I believe he was too. There's a lot of variation possible between your situation and my situation, but I suspect your odds are significantly better than mine due to shorter time, longer distance, and presence of one mask. I wouldn't worry too much.
posted by Alterscape at 7:40 PM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

I got COVID in July and my partner did not catch it from me. We live in a small condo, we both work from home, and we sleep in the same bed. On the other hand, I very likely caught COVID from a passing stranger on the street. All I mean is that worrying about the odds isn’t too fruitful. Get your supplies, hunker down and rest for a few days and dive into your favourite book.
posted by cranberrymonger at 8:21 PM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

I am very, very Covid cautious and I wouldn't be worried based on what you've said. Outdoors, check. Not too close up, check. Masked, big check. He hasn't actually tested positive, even bigger check.
You've almost certainly had closer exposures than this without knowing it. I don't know whether that's helpful or not, but it helps me to think that completely controlling your exposure isn't possible, so the best and least crazy-making way to handle it is to think in terms of a risk budget; you 'save up' as much as possible by limiting your exposure wherever you reasonably can, so you have a little risk in the bank to spend on situations you can't fully control.
It sounds like you probably have some pretty healthy savings, and I don't think you've really spent anything here!
posted by BlueNorther at 6:58 AM on November 4, 2022 [2 favorites]

I agree with everyone else's assessment that based on what we know the odds seem quite low. However, I don't think we can place much evidential weight on how precise those estimations are. Like, 1 in 1,000 and 1 in 1,000,000 are both quite low but depending on your individual situation and beliefs there may or may not be an important distinction between the two ends of that range. Personally, I dislike tools like microcovid because while there is benefit in having some sort of numerical anchor, I think it's hard to discount the associated bias that leads to greater confidence in its accuracy than is called for. My sense is that these kinds of calculations probably are more useful at a population level, but as with something like BMI, your local factors may be much more significant.

Also, any suggestions on not worrying obsessively about this are obciously welcomed

If you're comforted by the responses in this thread, great. If not, I think the only way to increase the evidence you have is to test. I'd strongly recommend PCR over rapid tests for the reasons I outline here. From what I understand, you're most likely to get an accurate result ~7 days post exposure, so that gives you some time to consider whether it's worth it for you based on your feelings and how convenient it is for you get the test.
posted by Cogito at 11:43 AM on November 4, 2022

I'm very COVID-cautious as well, and this seems extremely unlikely. I would not be worried at all after briefly interacting with a masked person outdoors who later tested positive.

My own recent "narrow escape" anecdote: despite my usual level of caution, I spontaneously agreed to visit a friend at home for dinner. We were indoors, unmasked, but near an open back door for most of the time. We had a conversation during and after dinner, so I'd say we were breathing on each other across the table quite a lot. The next morning they called to tell me they had just come down with cold symptoms and tested positive on a rapid test. They'd had no symptoms during dinner, so they had probably been relatively infectious at that point. I spent the next few days obsessively overanalysing every aspect of my own respiratory system, convinced that surely this had to be it and my luck must have finally run out. I did not, however, develop any real symptoms, and to the best of my knowledge did not get COVID.

Those few days were the most anxious I've ever been about a possible infection, and the way I dealt with it was by taking concrete steps that I thought would be helpful later if I did get sick. I prepped food and put it in the freezer so that I would have a supply ready just in case. I kept a lot more windows open than I normally do, increasing ventilation in my living space, so that I would avoid re-breathing shed viral particles (I'm not a doctor, but I've heard that this is a good idea). I also asked a family member to buy an item on my behalf instead of going to the shop in person as I had originally planned. I really don't think your situation warrants quarantine, but breathing fresh air and making sure you have enough food and medicine is generally a good idea and may make you feel better right now.
posted by confluency at 12:06 PM on November 4, 2022 [1 favorite]