Unique epidemiological and clinical features of the emerging 2019 novel coronavirus pneumonia (COVID‐19) implicate special control measures

Abstract

By 27 February 2020, the outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) caused 82 623 confirmed cases and 2858 deaths globally, more than severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) (8273 cases, 775 deaths) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) (1139 cases, 431 deaths) caused in 2003 and 2013, respectively. COVID‐19 has spread to 46 countries internationally. Total fatality rate of COVID‐19 is estimated at 3.46% by far based on published data from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC). Average incubation period of COVID‐19 is around 6.4 days, ranges from 0 to 24 days. The basic reproductive number (R0) of COVID‐19 ranges from 2 to 3.5 at the early phase regardless of different prediction models, which is higher than SARS and MERS. A study from China CDC showed majority of patients (80.9%) were considered asymptomatic or mild pneumonia but released large amounts of viruses at the early phase of infection, which posed enormous challenges for containing the spread of COVID‐19. Nosocomial transmission was another severe problem. A total of 3019 health workers were infected by 12 February 2020, which accounted for 3.83% of total number of infections, and extremely burdened the health system, especially in Wuhan. Limited epidemiological and clinical data suggest that the disease spectrum of COVID‐19 may differ from SARS or MERS. We summarize latest literatures on genetic, epidemiological, and clinical features of COVID‐19 in comparison to SARS and MERS and emphasize special measures on diagnosis and potential interventions. This review will improve our understanding of the unique features of COVID‐19 and enhance our control measures in the future.

Evidence based management guideline for the COVID-19 pandemic - Review article

“…Alarmingly, despite extensive efforts by governments to contain the virus, a recent Chinese study has demonstrated that although 80.9% of sufferers had subclinical or mild symptoms of the disease they still possessed the potential to spread the virus further (15). Interestingly, they also possessed the same viral load to patients who exhibited symptoms of the disease (16).…”

Optimization of Microbiological Laboratory Detection Strategy for Patients in A Designated Hospital Treating Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia in Anhui Province

“…The SARS-CoV, which caused an epidemic in 2002-2003, also belongs to this genus. Infection with these two viruses often leads to lower respiratory tract disease with poor clinical outcomes associated with old age and underlying health [15], while SARS-CoV-2 seems to be more transmissible than SARS-CoV [7]. The virus is transmitted mainly through respiratory is the author/funder, who has granted medRxiv a license to display the preprint in (which was not certified by peer review) preprint droplets or close contact.…”

“…The virus was confirmed as the cause of the unexplained pneumonia and named as severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), which has resulted in a rapid outbreak throughout China and global spread, and posed a significant threat to public health [2][3][4][5][6]. According to a recent study, the transmission capacity of SARS-CoV-2 was higher than the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-cov) [7]. In the meantime, the infection by the virus could cause substantial critical conditions (14.8%~15.74%), as well as significant mortality (1.4%~14.6%) [8][9][10].…”

COVID-19 is not just a flu. Learn from Italy and act now

“…Some information about SARS-CoV-2: the average incubation period is still unclear because of significant variation among patients, ranging from around 3.6 days [1] to around 6.4 days [2].…”