The death toll from the coronavirus reached 907 on Sunday, an increase of 96 cases from the previous day, according to the National Health Commission of China reported on Monday. The number of infected people also rose to 40,171, three thousand more than in the previous 24 hours.
The new virus has already claimed more fatalities than the so-called SARS, the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, which appeared in 2012, also in China.
The new coronavirus (2019-nCoV), which can cause potentially serious respiratory diseases such as pneumonia, was first detected at the end of the year in Wuhan, in central Hubei province.
Since then, along with the mainland of China and the Chinese regions of Macau and Hong Kong, other cases of infection with the new coronavirus have been confirmed in more than 20 countries. So far, the only two deaths from the new coronavirus recorded outside mainland China have occurred in the Philippines and Hong Kong.
VIRUSES CAN INFECT ONE IN EVERY 20 PEOPLE IN WUHAN
The new coronavirus could infect at least one in 20 people in the city of Wuhan, China, when it reaches a peak in the coming weeks, according to the prediction of scientists who have established models for the spread of the virus.
The trend supported in the cases reported in Wuhan “widely support” the mathematical models that London School of Hygiene & Tropical is using to predict the transmission of the dynamic epidemic, according to scientists at this institution, cited today by the financial information agency Bloomberg.
“Assuming current trends continue, we are projecting a peak in mid / late February” in Wuhan, said associate professor of infectious disease epidemiology Adam Kucharski at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical, cited by Bloomberg.
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WHAT ARE CORONAVIRUSES?
They are a large family of viruses that live in other animals (for example, birds, bats, small mammals) and that in humans usually cause respiratory diseases, from a common cold to more severe cases, such as pneumonia.
The coronaviruses can be transmitted between animals and people. Most strains of coronavirus circulate among animals and do not even infect humans. In fact, until now, only six strains coronavirus among the thousands that exist is that passed the species barrier and hit people.
WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THE FORMS OF TRANSMISSION, CONTACT AND SYMPTOMS?
Initially, health authorities came to think that there was no transmission between people, until the first transmission case between husband and wife. The World Health Organization has already admitted that there is transmission between humans, but there is still no clear evidence of how it is transmitted.
Filipe Froes explains that these viruses are generally transmitted by respiratory tract and mainly affect the respiratory tract, especially the lungs in severe forms.
The Portuguese pulmonologist and intensivist understands that these viruses usually adapt to their hosts as they are transmitted. As such, to ensure their transmissibility, they become less virulent and therefore less aggressive. That is, as transmission increases, the virus also becomes less violent.
The symptoms of these coronaviruses are more intense than a flu and include fever, pain, malaise and breathing difficulties. In the cases initially confirmed, 90% had a fever, 80% a dry cough, 20% shortness of breath and only about 15% had difficulty breathing.
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