Virus Update: Coronavirus Outbreak Numbers still Climb, With quite 73,000 Cases and 1,800 Deaths

Virus Update: Coronavirus Outbreak Numbers still Climb, With quite 73,000 Cases and 1,800 Deaths

There are 15 confirmed cases within us, quite 1,700 Chinese healthcare workers are infected, and thousands remain quarantined on a cruise ship near Tokyo.

Commuters wearing face masks as a preventative measure against the COVID-19 while they ride on Hong Kong's MTR subway

Commuters in Hong Kong wear face masks as a protective measure against the COVID-19 coronavirus. Miguel Candela/Getty Images

A coronavirus outbreak that originated in China continues to spread rapidly, and has now infected quite 73,000 people and claimed 1,873 lives.

Chinese health officials reported last week that quite 1,700 healthcare workers in China have contracted the virus, six of whom died from it. Almost 90 percent of these workers are within the Hubei province, where Wuhan, the epicenter of the virus, is found.

The number of cases within the province jumped significantly last week, with on the brink of 15,000 more cases reported — a drastic increase due largely to the implementation of the newest and faster diagnostic methods, the earth Health Organization (WHO) reported on Thursday. additionally, to lab tests, computerized tomography (CT) scans are now getting used there to detect lung infections caused by the virus. Outside of the Hubei province, laboratory confirmation for reporting of the virus remains required.

Officially named COVID-19 by the WHO, the virus was responsible within the week for the first death of a private in Japan, the third to be reported outside China. The others occurred within the Philippines and Hong Kong.

Two more cases within us were confirmed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), with one each in Texas and California, bringing the whole within the country to fifteen. Both patients are currently under federal quarantine and had recently been repatriated from Wuhan. A case was also reported during a patient in London for the first time, bringing the whole number of cases within the united kingdom to nine.

More than 3,700 passengers and crew members remain stranded on a cruise ship in Yokohama, Japan, under a quarantine that's planned to end on February 19. Japanese health officials confirmed dozens of more cases aboard the ship within the week, bringing the whole to 218, reported the WHO. Those who've tested positive for the virus are being evacuated off the ship to nearby hospitals.

The number of cases of the coronavirus has far surpassed the 8,000-plus cases of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) confirmed during that outbreak in 2003. a minimum of twenty-four countries is affected by COVID-19.

At a press conference on Monday, February 10, WHO Director-General Thedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, said there are concerning instances of onward transmission from people with no travel history in China, like recent cases reported in France and thus the united kingdom.

"The detection of this small number of cases could be the spark that becomes a way bigger fire," he says. "But for now, it's only a spark. We turn all countries to use the window of opportunity to prevent a way bigger fire."

As of within the week, the CDC has been investigating 467 potential cases across 42 states. U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex M. Azar II have declared the outbreak a public health emergency within us, and thus the WHO has declared things to be a public health emergency of international concern.

The U.S. Department of State has issued a "Level 4: don't Travel" advisory to China, but according to CDC Director Robert R. Redfield, MD, the immediate risk of the disease to the American public remains “low.” Dr. Ghebreyesus says most cases are mild, with roughly 2 percent resulting in death.

In a new study from one hospital published February 7, 2020, within the Journal of the American Medical Association, quite 40 percent of patients were suspected to possess contracted the virus through hospital-related transmissions. The study reported a death rate of quite 4 percent, with around one-quarter of the cases requiring ICU care.

The virus has spread to a minimum of 24 countries, included among them Australia, Belgium, Cambodia, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Macao, Malaysia, Nepal, Singapore, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, and thus the us .

Around 60 million people are under lockdown in China, and 20 U.S. airports are screening for the coronavirus in folks that have traveled to affected areas, the CDC and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reported. In Australia, people evacuated from Wuhan are flown to Christmas Island, a far off island around 2,000 miles away, where they go to be quarantined for two weeks.

The CDC issued orders that U.S. citizens who are evacuated from China be quarantined for 14 days. Meanwhile, United, American, and Delta airlines announced plans to suspend flights to and from China.

The uptick in cases raises questions on how easily and rapidly the coronavirus can spread between humans. A case involving the spouse of an Illinois woman who had been previously diagnosed with the virus marked the first instance of human-to-human transmission within the us , and a second case of person-to-person transmission, in California, was reported in early February. The virus had previously been detected within the country only among patients who had recently traveled from Wuhan.

What Is a Coronavirus?

The strain 2019-nCoV may be a component of the family of coronaviruses that range from the cold to the center East respiratory syndrome (MERS) and SARS, according to William Schaffner, MD, professor of medicine within the department of health policy at the Vanderbilt University School of drugs in Nashville, Tennessee.

During a SARS outbreak between November 2002 and July 2003, there are 8,098 probable cases reported to the WHO, including 29 cases from us , according to the CDC. there are also 774 SARS-related deaths, none of them among the U.S. cases.

Coronaviruses commonly circulate in animals, which experts estimate are responsible for about 60 percent of human infectious diseases, noted a bit of writing published in March 2018 in TuftsNow. When a plague is transmitted between animals and humans, it’s called a spillover event. In fact, some researchers believe that the new strain may are passed from bats to humans via an intermediary animal, the pangolin.

“Although these viruses have similarities, it’s like relatives. you'll distinguish among your different cousins albeit they seem to be a part of the same family,” says Dr. Schaffner. “This new virus may be a component of the ‘family,’ but we’re just beginning to study what proportion it’s the same or different from these other coronaviruses.”

For example, SARS was more easily transmitted from person to person than MERS, which isn't as transmissible between people, he says. “People seem to accumulate MERS largely from camels,” says Schaffner.

"We’ve been concerned and truly expecting that there would be some person-to-person transmission [of this coronavirus],” Schaffner says.

“There could also be a reported episode of a patient who seems to possess transmitted this new coronavirus to 14 healthcare workers,” he adds. “We would designate that person a ‘super-spreader’: someone who is extremely readily able to spread through close contact. How common that's, we don’t know. That’s usually a fairly unusual event, so we hope that that’s not the norm. However, we don’t skill frequently human-to-human transmission is occurring. There are all kinds of little question marks that have come up.”

A masked shopper wearing a bag is seen outside a supermarket in Wuhan in central China's Hubei province, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak. Barcroft

2019 Coronavirus Origins

Known as 2019-nCoV, the coronavirus appears to possess originated within the central Chinese city of Wuhan. Chinese health officials suspect that the outbreak began at an outsized seafood and animal market in Wuhan, suggesting that the virus began as an animal-to-person spread, according to the CDC, then began to transmit from person-to-person. Two people within the Guangdong in southern China had contracted the virus from relations, and a couple of medical workers also tested positive for the virus.

“The major source of the virus is assumed to be this live animal market, which has subsequently closed,” Schaffner says. “But there is a spread of patients who have already been reported who haven't had direct contact with this market."

Would I like to need Extra Precautions thanks to the New Virus?

For folks that are concerned about their risk because of travel or potential contact through visitors, extra precautions are often taken. during a WHO video about the coronavirus, Maria Van Kerkhove, MD, an infectious-disease epidemiologist and technical consultant for WHO, makes the next recommendations:

Because coronavirus typically causes respiratory symptoms, basic hand hygiene, like washing your hands with soap and water, is usually recommended.

Practice respiratory hygiene by sneezing into your elbow.

Protect yourself against a possible animal source by avoiding unnecessary unprotected contact with live animals. confirm you wash your hands thoroughly after contact with an animal.

Make sure meat is cooked thoroughly before consuming




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