A Global Emergency

How the common fever has become the main symptoms of a fatal virus.

Emily Hoggard|February 14, 2020

After meeting on Thursday, January 30th, the World Health Organization declared corona virus a global emergency.
The coronavirus is an RNA virus that causes a variety of diseases. In humans, the virus is usually a mild respiratory infection or the common cold, however rarer forms are lethal. Although no vaccine is currently available, new efforts are being made by China and other countries to contain this new coronavirus and keep it from spreading into more countries. Although the virus has been reported in multiple countries, the new coronavirus has had its biggest impact in China, particularly the city of Wuhan.
“Coronaviruses are zoonotic, meaning they are transmitted between animals and people. Detailed investigations found that SARS-CoV was transmitted from civet cats to humans and MERS-CoV from dromedary camels to humans. Several known coronaviruses are circulating in animals that have not yet infected humans,” says the World Health Organization on their page about 2019-nCoV.
2019-nCoV primarily spreads through a sick person coughing or sneezing onto a surface and another person coming into contact with that surface. The virus is often transmitted when a person who comes into contact with the virus touches their eyes, nose, or mouth. Symptoms, including a fever, cough, and shortness of breath, can appear anywhere between 2 to 14 days after exposure. On December 31st, 2019, China reported to the World Health Organization that there were an alarming number of pneumonia cases in Wuhan. The virus was unknown. It wasn’t until January 7th, 2020, that the disease was identified as coronavirus and named 2019-nCoV.
In Wuhan and other cities throughout China, markets sell live animals for consumption, which are held in unsanitary cages along the streets. This is a suspected reason as to how the virus is being transmitted from animals to people. 2019-nCoV is suspected to come from bats, a delicacy in China. Doctors also think that pigs have an involvement in the coronavirus transmission, similar to the porcine deltacoronavirus (PDCoV), which was identified in 2012 in Chinese pigs.
Triton junior Jacob Forrest has become interested in the coronavirus outbreak and has been doing his own research for entertainment. “

China is definitely not telling the full truth in regards to how bad the coronavirus actually is,” says Forrest.
With a population of about 11 million people in the city of Wuhan, and 1.386 billion in China, it has been difficult to contain the disease, and coronavirus has already spread to more than 13 countries. More than 200 people around the world have died, and there have been over 9,800 cases. China has begun quarantining the city of Wuhan, where the outbreak has been worst.
Maggie Rand, a junior at Triton Regional High School, works part time at Anna Jaques Hospital in Newburyport. “There’s a sign in all the hallways and lobbies warning patients to notify their nurse or doctor if they’ve been to China in the past two weeks. It’s definitely pretty scary,” Rand says.
Other countries have made plans to prevent the coronavirus from spreading into them. Russia has closed sections of its border with China and is only accepting limited visas, and Australia plans to quarantine any citizen who has evacuated from Wuhan onto a remote island for at least two weeks. On the morning January 30th, a cruise ship stopped in Civitavecchia, a port in Italy, was placed on lockdown after it was suspected that a passenger had contracted coronavirus. Later that day, the lockdown was lifted and all passengers were allowed back on and off the ship. The WHO has gone as far as advising Americans to avoid going to China, and asking nonessential US government personnel to cancel or postpone any trips to China. Epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan, who is working in a government-appointed group on the virus, says that he believes that the epidemic could peak this month, although he made an earlier prediction that was incorrect when he claimed 2019-nCoV would peak earlier in the month.
This new strain of coronavirus is starting a panic throughout the world, and many speculate what the outcome of coronavirus will be on the world. Although infection numbers have fallen in China, coronavirus experts remain cautious.