The typical common cold incubation period is from two to five days, but symptoms can appear in as little as ten hours after the virus first enters the nose. The range of the common cold incubation period may be explained by the number of different viruses that can cause common cold symptoms. It is known that some viruses produce symptoms of disease more quickly than others and several hundred different viruses have been associated with the common cold. Another explanation for the wide range in the common cold incubation period is that some people never develop symptoms, even though an infection is present. This makes it hard for scientists to determine an exact common cold incubation period, but in most diseases, there is only a range, not an exact figure.

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