SynthesisThe Lancet. Infectious diseases2009
Incubation periods of acute respiratory viral infections: a systematic review.
Synthesis in The Lancet. Infectious diseases, 2009. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 448 papers, 10 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
448 citing papers in PubMed, 10 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Respiratory Syncytial Virus Transmission in Closed Community Settings That Include Children: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Influenza and other respiratory viruses · 2026Pooled it
- Associations between sunshine and influenza or influenza-like illness, a systematic review and meta-analysis.International journal of biometeorology · 2026Pooled it
- Estimates of epidemiological parameters for H5N1 influenza in humans: a rapid review.BMC infectious diseases · 2025Pooled it
- Palivizumab for preventing severe respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection in children.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2025Pooled it
- Assessing changes in incubation period, serial interval, and generation time of SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern: a systematic review and meta-analysis.BMC medicine · 2023Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Comprehensive estimation for the length and dispersion of COVID-19 incubation period: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Infection · 2022Pooled it
- Incubation Period of COVID-19 Caused by Unique SARS-CoV-2 Strains: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.JAMA network open · 2022Pooled it
- Palivizumab for preventing severe respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection in children.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2021Pooled it
- Serial interval and incubation period of COVID-19: a systematic review and meta-analysis.BMC infectious diseases · 2021Pooled it
- Characterizing the impact of incorporating spatially aggregated human mobility data into infectious disease models.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Influenza.Nature reviews. Disease primers · 2026Review
- Utilizing Virtual Clinical Trials to Inform Target Coverage That Drives RSV Antiviral Efficacy.CPT: pharmacometrics & systems pharmacology · 2026Article
- Beyond Infection-Indoor Airborne Pathogens as Contributors to Respiratory Inflammation and Immune Dysregulation: A Narrative Review.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Accounting for the long-distance transmission route: An epidemiological model of airborne disease transmission in hospitals.PLoS computational biology · 2026Article
- The limitations of non-mechanistic methods for characterizing pathogen-pathogen interactions: A simulation study.PLoS computational biology · 2026Article
- From weather to symptoms: Preliminary links between weather and inflammation in schizophrenia.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2026Article
- Informing quarantine policy for measles control in primary school and daycare settings: insights from a simulation study, Flanders, Belgium.Euro surveillance : bulletin Europeen sur les maladies transmissibles = European communicable disease bulletin · 2026Article
- Impact of healthcare-associated respiratory virus infections in children.Infection prevention in practice · 2026Article
- From 'droplet' to 'respiratory' precautions: implementation and adherence monitoring in a Swiss tertiary care center, 2023-2025.Antimicrobial resistance and infection control · 2026Article
388 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Knowledge of the incubation period is essential in the investigation and control of infectious disease, but statements of incubation period are often poorly referenced, inconsistent, or based on limited data. In a systematic review of the literature on nine respiratory viral infections of public-health importance, we identified 436 articles with statements of incubation period and 38 with data for pooled analysis. We fitted a log-normal distribution to pooled data and found the median incubation period to be 5.6 days (95% CI 4.8-6.3) for adenovirus, 3.2 days (95% CI 2.8-3.7) for human coronavirus, 4.0 days (95% CI 3.6-4.4) for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus, 1.4 days (95% CI 1.3-1.5) for influenza A, 0.6 days (95% CI 0.5-0.6) for influenza B, 12.5 days (95% CI 11.8-13.3) for measles, 2.6 days (95% CI 2.1-3.1) for parainfluenza, 4.4 days (95% CI 3.9-4.9) for respiratory syncytial virus, and 1.9 days (95% CI 1.4-2.4) for rhinovirus. When using the incubation period, it is important to consider its full distribution: the right tail for quarantine policy, the central regions for likely times and sources of infection, and the full distribution for models used in pandemic planning. Our estimates combine published data to give the detail necessary for these and other applications.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.