What is Coronavirus?

“Coronavirus” is often prefaced with the term “novel” these days, because that’s precisely what it is: a new strain in a family of viruses we’ve all seen before — and had in some form. According to WHO, coronaviruses are a large family of viruses ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases.

These can infect humans and animals. The strain that began spreading in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province in China, is associated with two other coronaviruses that have caused significant outbreaks in recent years: severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS).

What are the symptoms of the new coronavirus?

The novel coronavirus causing the COVID-19 disease has spread from China’s first outbreak site to 75 countries worldwide. According to Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch, if successful restrictions are not enforced, COIVID-19 could potentially infect between 40% and 70% of the world’s population in the coming year.

Most of those cases would be mild, and some people might have no symptoms. But the possibility of new virus infection can be terrifying. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the symptoms include nausea, coughing, and shortness of breath. Such symptoms appear between two days and two weeks of virus exposure.

Read More: Understanding About The Various Types Of Masks Used In Era of CORONA Panic

According to a study in the American Medical Association Journal, as many as 98% of COVID-19 patients have a fever, 76% to 82% have a dry cough, and 11% to 44% show exhaustion and fatigue.

The disease tends to get worse with age, with the age range of 30- to 79-year-olds predominating the reported cases in Wuhan, where the outbreak started, according to a JAMA report. Kids seem less likely to suffer severe illness symptoms.

Symptoms of infected with coronavirus

Cold or flu-like symptoms usually occur 2-4 days after coronavirus infection and are generally mild. However, signs vary from person to person, and some virus types may be fatal.

Symptoms are:

• sneezing
• runny nose
• fatigue
• cough
• fever in rare cases
• sore throat
• exacerbated asthma

Scientists cannot quickly grow human coronaviruses in the laboratory, unlike rhinovirus, another common cold cause. This makes it challenging to assess coronavirus ‘ impacts on national economies and public health.

In more serious COVID-19 cases, patients experience pneumonia, meaning their lungs tend to fill with pockets of pus or fluid. This leads to breathlessness and intense coughing.

Currently, testing for the virus that causes COVID-19 in the United States is limited to people with severe symptoms, according to Paul Biddinger, director of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Emergency Preparedness Study, Assessment and Practice Program, who spoke on a university webcast March 2.

It means testing at the first sign of fever or sniffle is not necessary. Biddinger added that seeking medical attention for a mild disease may also potentially spread the disease or lead to new diseases being caught in hospitals or clinics.

If you become sick with these symptoms and reside in or have traveled to a spreading region of COVID-19, which now includes parts of the U.S., the CDC suggests contacting the doctor first rather than going to a clinic. Doctors work with state health departments and the CDC to decide who to screen for the new virus.

The CDC advises, however, that people with COVI-19 or any respiratory disease monitor their symptoms carefully. Worsening breath shortage is a reason to seek medical care, especially for older people or people with underlying health conditions.

How does coronavirus spread?

Spreads better than SARS, and is close to other cold-like symptoms, experts said. It seems highly transmissible, and as cases are mild, the disease may be more common than current test numbers suggest.

People transmitting the virus have been identified before they show symptoms. Still, most experts think this is probably not a significant driver of new infections.

Though what matters is that symptoms can be mild, and the illness can quickly spread before people realize they’re sick. SARS spread as people had a full-blown disease, which is one reason it could be contained— it was easier to tell who had the virus.

A study in the New England Journal of Medicine indicated covid-19 hits peak infectiousness shortly after people start feeling sick, spreading like flu. A study published in JAMA chronicled the case of a 20-year-old Wuhan woman who tended to infect five relatives. However, she never had signs of disease.

Most possibly, the virus spreads through:

• Close contact with infectious.
• Touch with cough droplets or sneeze droplets.
• Covering items or surfaces that have a cough or sneeze droplets from an infected person, and then covering your mouth or face.

How does it prevent it?

Community surgical masks are only helpful in preventing the transmission of coronavirus disease to others. If you’re right, you don’t need to wear a surgical mask, as there’s little evidence supporting the widespread use of surgical masks in healthy people to prevent public transmission.

There is currently no 2019 coronavirus disease vaccine (COVID-19). Avoiding this infection is the best way to prevent illness. Nonetheless, CDC also recommends routine preventive measures to help prevent the spread of respiratory diseases, including:

• Avoid close contact with sick people.
• Stop touching eyes, nose, mouth.
• Stay home while sick.
• Cover the cough with a tissue, then chuck the fabric in the garbage.
• Use a regular household spray or scrub, clean, and disinfect regularly contaminated items and surfaces.
• Wash your hands often for at least 20 seconds, particularly after going to the bathroom; before eating; and after blowing your nose, coughing, or sneezing.
• If soap and water are not readily available, use at least 60% alcohol-based hand sanitizer. Wash hands with soap and water if hands are visibly dirty.

Summery and some notes about The Coronavirus:

Size of The coronavirus is larger with a cell diameter of 400-500 micro, so any mask prevents its entry so there is no need to exploit pharmacists to trade with muzzles.

The virus does not stay in the air, but on the ground, so it may not be transmitted by the air.

When coronavirus falls on a metal surface, the virus will live for 12 hours, so washing hands with soap and water well will do the trick.

Coronavirus, when it falls on fabrics, stays for 9 hours so washing clothes or exposing them to the sun for two hours is enough for the purpose of killing him.

The virus life is maxed 10 to 12 minutes on the hands, so putting the alcohol sanitizer in the pocket is enough for the purpose of cure and prevention.

If the virus is exposed to a temperature of 26-27°C, it will be killed, it does not live in hot areas. Also drinking hot and warm water and exposure to the sun is good enough.

Stay away from ice cream and cold food is important.

Gargling with warm water and salt kills tonsils and prevents them from leaking into the lungs.

Adhering to these instructions is sufficient to prevent the virus.

UNICEF