The virus called 2019nCoV have bring havoc in china, killed more than 420 people there till now while more than 20,000 people are effected as it continues to spread outside china.
According to CNN, Coronavirus has been spread in 25
countries and territories since it was first detected in Chines city of “Wuhan”
in December last year.
International researchers and companies are
racing to develop a vaccine to stop the virus spread.
What is Coronavirus?
2019nCoV is newly identified virus type of Coronavirus
family, the family includes a large number of viruses of which only 7
(including the present type) type of viruses known to affect people.
Majority of people was effected to this newly
virus have suffered from mild fever and expected to make full recovery, Like SARS
(An old type of Coronavirus)(1) people
effected from present type of Coronavirus are of elderly age. According to CNN report, 80 percent of affected people are above 60 years of
age, those have pre-lung related complications and weak or not so healthy immune system.
Symptoms of Coronavirus
It starts with mild fever, followed by dry
cough and then, after a few days shortens the breath(2),
while some patients need to admit in hospital for treatment. About 1-in-four
cases faces severe conditions. Generally, Corona virus infection causes
sneezing, runny nose and mild cold ranged from victims with little or no
appearing symptoms to severely ill and dying victims.
How is the Coronavirus
spread?
As the recent episode of Coronavirus outbreak
in Wuhan (China) is a new type of illness, researchers are still evaluating how
it spreads from individual to individual, however comparative infections in
general spread through cough and sneeze droplets.
When an infected individual coughs or sneezes,
they discharge tinny drops of saliva or fluid. These tinny drops may fall on
people in the vicinity and can be either breathed in or picked up on the hands
and then transferred when someone contacts their face, causing infection. For
influenza, some medical guidelines, describe exposure as being less than 6 feet
of an infected person, who coughs and sneezes for 10 minutes or longer.
Likewise, infections can also be spread through
beads landing on surfaces, such as seats in trains or buses, school desks etc.
How deadly is coronavirus
As the latest episode of coronavirus is
continuing to cross the international borders with its deadly consequences, more than 20,000 coronavirus cases have
been detected as of today, the
main questions arising in everyone’s mind are “how deadly coronavirus is” and
“how to contain the coronavirus”.
The epidemic reached its peak in late 2019 and
early 2020, when this article was written, according to live dashboard
developed by Johns Hopkins University the figure of coronavirus detected cases
reached to 20,704, out of which
20,492 cases were detected in mainland China.
427 were dead
of those who contracted the infection, so the fatality rate is about 2.07
percent.
The fatality
rate is about 4.9 percent in the city of Wuhan, where the virus originated.
According to
another coronavirus tracker of same University, revealed 705 people recovered
from the disease, giving it a recovery rate of 3.39 percent.
So, compare to
SARS, which had a morality rate of 9.6
percent, current 2019h-CoV is much less deadly.
While China
National Health Committee also predicting that the fatality rate will likely
drop in future, as better treatment, vigilant efforts from International health
agencies against the epidemic and advance medical resources would see more
people recover.
Where to find Corona Vaccine?
As International researchers and pharmaceutical
companies have begun the race to develop a vaccine. But it could take years,
for the time being there is no actively working vaccine available. Although
experiments are underway and today there is any update about the Coronavirus
drug being tested on human for the first time(3). We
hope for the good.
WHO response to the Outbreak
As China has declared an emergency, World Health
Organization (WHO) also came out with its efforts to keep the people safe and have
declared International public health emergency(4),
as they did in their initial response to outbreak of swine flu. This act
defines the outbreak an event of extraordinary nature, which constitutes health
risk to other parts of the World through spread and requires immediate response
from International community to safeguard the lives of people living particularly in affected areas and other parts of the World.
In this recent catastrophe, our role as a
blogger or content writer, should be to spread authentic and correct
information while to limit the spread of misleading information, harmful
content and false claims.
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In accordance with the” WHO guidelines about
Novel Coronavirus (2019 nCoV)”(5)
1-
Wash your hands frequently with soap in clean
running water.
2-
Cover the mouth and nose with a piece of cloth
or tissue at the time of cough or sneezing, than throw out the tissue or piece
of cloth in the bin and wash the hands. If you don’t have cloth or tissue
around, than cough or sneeze at your and wash your hands immediately.
3-
Using
face mask can protects you to some extent by block liquid droplets, however it
does not halt smaller aerosol particles, which can pass through its material,
in addition, using these masks, also leave the eyes exposed while some viruses
infect the person from eyes.
4- Keep
yourself at distance of at least 3 feet from other people affected with
coughing, sneezing or fever.
5-
If visiting live market in affected areas,
avoid direct contact with animals and surface.
6-
People living in affected areas should avoid
eating raw or undercooked animal meat and products, exercise care while handing
raw meat, milk or animal organs
7-
If you have returned from affected area and
facing high temperature, cough, sore throat, runny nose or difficulty in
breathing, do not leave your home with the advice of your doctor.
8-
Seek immediate medical help in case of fever,
flue or difficulty in breathing.
References:
(1) Severe Acute
Respiratory Syndrome(SARS), Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) https://www.cdc.gov/sars/index.html
(2) 2019 Noval Coronavirus
Symptoms, Centre for Disease Control and Prevention(CDC) https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/symptoms.html
(3) The First Coronavirus
drug candidate is set for testing in China https://fortune.com/2020/02/03/coronavirus-vaccine-testing-in-china/
(4) Public Health
Emergency, World Health Organization (WHO) Director General’s Statement. https://www.who.int/dg/speeches/detail/who-director-general-s-statement-on-ihr-emergency-committee-on-novel-coronavirus-(2019-ncov)
(5) WHO advice for the public about Novel
Coronavirus
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