system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
CMV: In Zombie fiction where everybody is 'already infected' or automatically zombifies when they die, bites from zombies shouldn't be a 100% guaranteed death sentence

This kind of a trivial topic compared to some of the other stuff posted in here, but this has kinda been bugging me. This mostly applies to The Walking Dead but could also work for other zombie series/media that doesn't have a virus or disease that can *only* be spread via bites or contact with infected bodily fluids.

But here it goes, if everyone is already infected with the zombie infection but only zombify upon death if their brains aren't destroyed, then a zombie bite couldn't be the sole cause of zombification, but rather sepsis/bacterial infection that leads to death and subsequent zombification (I don't know if that's the right terminology). So it could be inferred that if the bite victim was given antibiotics or antivirals then they could survive the bite and not die and zombify.

The zombie bite = guaranteed death trope has kinda been overdone and not really explored well outside of 'amputate bitten limb' which  doesn't make much sense because wouldn't the infection have already circulated through the body by the time amputation has performed, maybe someone with a medical background can clarify this?

Anyways I hope someone CMV on this topic.
gpt
The viral load means its airborne infection is low enough for your immune system to keep it at bay till death prevents it from doing its job and you turn, when you get bitten it pushes you over the threshold and your innate and adaptive immune responses are overwhelmed and you become a zombie. Makes sense to me! Lol.