Question: How quickly can your body deal with the noro virus?

Rachel Dakin answered on 13 Nov 2013:

I’d say pretty quickly but not quickly enough that you don’t get symptoms!
Norovirus is spread in the air (if you are near someone who already has it) or on surfaces if people haven’t washed there hands – basically by poor hygiene. Once you have ingested it (through your mouth or nose) it travels through your stomach to your intestine. Here it latches on and infects cells. Once inside the virus takes over the cell, it uses the cells machinery to make copies of itself. This takes roughly 12-24hrs but varies between people. As the virus makes more and more copies of itself it becomes toxic to the cell. The cell bursts open releasing the virus which can then infect another cell and start copying itself again. As soon as the cells start dying (probably after 12-24hrs) your body recognises something is going on and it starts an immune response. Lots of immune cells are involved and these can clear up the dying cells and also produce antibodies against the virus. The antibodies then travel to the intestine and inactivate the virus. This normally happens pretty quickly but again it depends on the person. A healthy person is likely to make a quicker and better immune response – although this isn’t true for everyone. It depends when you think the norovirus is dealt with but to deactivate all the virus probably takes around 72-96hrs although you might not still have symptoms by then.
What’s good is that if you contract the same strain of norovirus again you already have antibodies to fight it -you are immune.
Our immune system is like an army protecting our bodies – it’s pretty impressive if you ask me. It’s also pretty complicated so I hope I’ve explained this so you can understand.