How long do viruses survive in dead bodies?

There’s no easy answer to how long viruses survive in dead bodies, but we’ve learned lessons from the past, says virologist Matt Koci.

Some of the many questions about today’s COVID-19 pandemic revolve around what happens to viruses in the remains of humans or animals.

For example, could people get sick from digging up decades-old bodies? Or could future scientists get more information about COVID-19 by examining human remains a century from now?

Here, Koci, a professor in North Carolina State University’s poultry science department whose work focuses on host-microbe interactions in birds, addresses those questions and others:

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