Photo: CDC on Unsplash
This illustration, created at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), reveals ultrastructural morphology exhibited by coronaviruses. Note the spikes that adorn the outer surface of the virus, which impart the look of a corona surrounding the virion, when viewed electron microscopically. A novel coronavirus, named Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), was identified as the cause of an outbreak of respiratory illness first detected in Wuhan, China in 2019. The illness caused by this virus has been named coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
Corona viruses are a family of viruses that primarily infect animals, but have caused three epidemics in humans since 2002. The latest of these coronaviruses is SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19.
Symptoms of COVID-19
Transmission and incubation of COVID-19
Contagion et mortality rate of SARS-COV-2
According to Business Insider, “R0 refers to the average number of people that one sick person goes on to infect in a group that has no immunity. Experts use it to predict how far and how fast a disease will spread, and the number can also inform policy decisions about how to contain an outbreak.”
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), “for COVID-19, data to date suggest that 80% of infections are mild or asymptomatic, 15% are severe infection, requiring oxygen and 5% are critical infections, requiring ventilation.”
“For COVID-19, data to date suggest that 80% of infections are mild or asymptomatic.”
The World Health Organisation
According to an article on The Conversation, “The fatality rate for the disease is estimated to be 0.66%, according to data from China. In other words, 0.66% of people who are formally diagnosed with COVID-19, die. But the rate varies dramatically for different age groups, ranging from 0.0016% for children under ten to 7.8% in people over 79. Similar rates are seen in New York city.”
“0.66% of people who are formally diagnosed with COVID-19, die.”
The Conversation
