Lowering of burst size, lengthening of latent period, or slowing of phage adsorption such due to the action of bacterial resistance mechanisms.
Operationally this is a circumstance in which efficiency of center of infection (EOP) is substantially greater than the efficiency of plating (ECOI). Contrast with abortive infections which, strictly speaking, can be viewed as circumstances where both EOP and ECOI are substantially reduced.
In other words, with reduced infection vigor infections are productive, and therefore able to produce functional phages, but not necessarily sufficiently robust infections to result in plaque formation with a given indicator bacterium (i.e., lawn bacterium).
This idea of reduced infection vigor to our knowledge was first discussed by Hyman and Abedon (2010) and specifically as a means of distinguishing, in ecologically relevant terms, the two EOP versus ECOI circumstances indicated two paragraphs above.
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