A Virus Was Found! Meaning of the Alert?

[Reflex]

Did a scan on a file, and it came up positive for a virus or a trojan or something.  Was trying to find the answer in the user guide, but when the alert come up, what does it actually mean? 

Does it mean that the virus' code was merely detected, and not active?  Because the alert has the reassuring line of "There is no reason to panic."

I did not execute the file yet.  In fact, it's not even on my physical drives, it was on a backup CD-R that I have.

[Lisandro]

Does it mean that the virus' code was merely detected, and not active?

Correct.
Can you upload the file to www.virustotal.com to check if it is really a false positive?

[Reflex]

Well it's a corrupted word document from my laptop.  I'm almost certain it's a false positive.
It got corrupted when my laptop shut down suddenly because I ran out of batteries.

Its flagged as a trojan for some reason.

[Lisandro]

Well it's a corrupted word document from my laptop.  I'm almost certain it's a false positive.
It got corrupted when my laptop shut down suddenly because I ran out of batteries.

Its flagged as a trojan for some reason.

And then? Will you just delete the corrupted file?
Is everything ok?

[Reflex]

Well, it was on CDR media, so I just have to take out or discard the disc

I was just worried that the act of scanning the file activated something, but I guess I don't have to worry about that since when I took a closer look, it was just because it was corrupted.  I remember it gave me trojan warnings when I tried to access it before on my laptop.  But that was with PC-Cillin if I remember correctly.  It was a false positive back then, too.

[Lisandro]

I was just worried that the act of scanning the file activated something

Don't worry. It's ok.