I agree, and I’ll go one step further that whether or not they know they are positive, many aren’t masking.
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Even though the CDC recommends two negative antigen tests to end isolation, really everyone is lucky if people are isolating for 5 days and then masking for an additional 5. What your friend did doesn’t sound unusual. Was she wearing a good mask?
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Minor correction: My son, the one who got COVID on the way to his grandma’s funeral across the country, stayed in the hotel 8 days (not 10). He had felt better for some time. He read that there is a lag between the end of contagiousness and negative testing. So he did not yet have a negative antigen test. He masked on the way home.
While he was in the hotel, sick, I brought him soft foods like mashed potatoes and ice cream because his throat hurt. I left the food at his door and then eventually met him in the driveway with better food. So he didn’t go out at all, for food or anything else. Basically isolated.
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Given the cost and lack of availability of antigen tests (discussed recently here), most people do not have a stockpile to use when they may have COVID-19 or when they want to check if they are still contagious.
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Rapid antigen tests tend to show positive when contagious. PCR tests tend to show positive when infected even before or after being contagious. PCR tests may also show positive for a few months after the infection is cleared.
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I honestly doubt that’s the biggest reason. I think (at least around here), you could put boxes of tests in people’s bathrooms and they still wouldn’t test to see if they were contagious. And even if they did and were, they wouldn’t modify their normal daily behavior.
(Currently listening to someone who’s been coughing non-stop in my office the last 2 days…)
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@ucbalumnus my son waited in the hotel 8 days from a positive antigen test, so maybe he found a study that let him feel okay about flying home. The mashed potato diet was getting to him 
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Did you vary the food with stuff like soup, oatmeal, soft tofu, etc.?
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Just kidding about the mashed potatoes. I am known for overdoing so in first stage he had about 10 choices of soft foods and as he got better, he could eat anything so I expanded the offerings. But 8 nights in a chain hotel when you planned for a weekend visit was tough. He flew with a mask and hoped the study he dug up was right.
We zoomed the funeral service while he sat in his car outside the church.
Personal opinion. Precautions take August 2020 or August 2021 are much different than precautions taken August 2023. To me, that does NOT mean you do nothing - you do test, you do stay away from others with active symptoms, you do mask if still positive and doing something like running to the store for groceries or walking down the hall at work before going to your solo office. You should avoid unmasked mass exposure to people until testing negative but you do not have to hide at home in the basement for 10 days like a couple years ago.
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@abasket what about trains and planes? This thread is about travel. Curious what you think folks should do in 2023 when they need to get home but test positive.
I think there is a disconnect between what people “should do” and what they are actually doing. I take the train regularly and I can tell you that there are people hacking up a lung without masks (and we saw that on planes as well when we travelled earlier in the summer).
I think as a society we’ve gotten well past the point of covid fatigue. My H and I were the only people in our very crowded train car masked up yesterday and people give us crazy looks when we used our hand sanitizer.
I sadly think that the onus is now on those who are immunocompromised to stay home and take extra precautions because most people are just going about their daily lives, even if they are sick.
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You’re right - I sort of forgot about the travel emphasis as the thread sometimes wanders!
There isn’t a great solution. It was sort of “easier” when it was 2020 and even 2021 and so many people just WEREN’T traveling! I’ll say this. I personally would still mask on a plane. But FOR SURE I would throw a mask on a plane if my seatmate came on with a mask. For them and for me. I won’t know if they are masking because they have Covid or if they are being preventative. But for both ways, I’d mask.
The work world is probably not so acceptant now of people staying home for a week or more if you contract Covid on a trip. And for many reasons (money, child care, work responsibilities, etc.), much of the public cannot just “stay put” a train or plane trip away from home for days.
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Amen. Unfortunately, that’s the reality. That’s where N95 masks with valves for the wearer’s comfort come in handy.
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But wasn’t that always the case with colds and flu, RSV, pneumonia? I have a lot of friends who are immuno compromised and they have always been careful in crowds, at stores, in theaters and continue to use those practices.
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I wouldn’t fly with an active flu, either. I once delayed a flight for a cold but for a different reason (ears).
I’m not saying the immune compromised person would fly while sick, just that many other people have been flying, shopping, going to concerts while infectious for many years and nothing has changed. You must take care to protect yourself.
I was pretty lax before covid but now am a lot better about keeping my 6 feet of space, washing my hands more often, wearing a mask when I need to. I think it helps ME stay healthier, but may not help others. When I was teaching, I washed the shared tools (pens, pencils, white boards, manipulatives) a lot more often than I ever would have (but should have) before covid.
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Friends just returned from a 2 week cruise of the British Isles (small boat). Husband, who is a real germophobe, has covid. They were supposed to watch their grandkids when their son/DIL went away next week. Oh well. Plan B.
Wont the Husband be past the contageous time by then? Or are they afraid the wife will now also catch it?
How long someone is contagious can vary considerably. Using rapid antigen testing (which tends to correlate with contagiousness) may be better than assuming 5 or 10 days or whatever.