Coronaviruses are a family of viruses that primarily cause respiratory infections. “Coronaviruses can cause mild infections such as colds, but also more serious infections, such as pneumonia,” explains Juan Pablo Horcajada, Chief of the Infectious Diseases Service of the Hospital del Mar de Barcelona and a member of the Spanish Infectious Diseases Society, to EL PERIÓDICO and Clinical Microbiology (SEIMC).
“The name of the new Chinese coronavirus is 2019-nCoV: it has a different genome than other coronavirus, it is new within the family and was not known.” The Chinese coronavirus has a 3% mortality rate.
- How is the virus spread?
Although it was initially thought that it was spread from animals to humans (the outbreak began in an animal market in the Chinese city of Wuhan), we now know that it can be spread from person to person, by coughing or sneezing. Recently it has been known that it is also spread during the incubation phase, while the person has not yet developed the symptoms.
The National Federation of Ambulance Entrepreneurs (ANEA) has disseminated a series of training videos to establish a protocol with standardized guidelines for the adequate and safe care and transfer of patients with infectious diseases, such as the coronavirus.
- What are the symptoms?
Five are the main symptoms of a Chinese coronavirus infectio
- What prevention measures must be taken?
“The measures that citizens must take are hand hygiene, covering up when coughing or sneezing, avoiding contact with people who have flu-like symptoms and avoiding trips to the Wuhan area,” explains Horcajada, who adds that “there is no vaccine or antiviral treatment ” for the coronavirus.
Only their symptoms are treated, with paracetamol or ibuprofen and hydration in mild cases. In severe cases, thermodynamic and / or respiratory support is performed.
- Are there reasons to be alert in Spain?
“It’s an emerging disease and people are worried because we live in a globalized world,” says Horcajada. “We are prepared to deal with this virus because we have powerful epidemiology and public health services and there is sufficient preparation to prevent its spread,” concludes this expert.
Although the Spanish Ministry of Health said it considered “very low” the risk of introducing the new coronavirus in Spain , a first case has already been confirmed , that of a German tourist in La Gomera .
In addition, there are other reasons to be alert: health authorities link this virus to Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), whose outbreak also began in China and in 2003 killed 813 people worldwide (646 of them in China). Even so, the lethality rate of 2019-nCoV (3%) is lower than that of the SARS (10%).
- How has the epidemic progressed?
Thus we have counted the first days of the coronavirus epidemic and its arrival in Spain:
China enters money to stop the stock market crisis;
The People’s Bank of China has announced that it will inject 1.2 billion yuan into the country’s economy, some 156,000 million euros, to mitigate the negative effects of the coronavirus outbreak. The different bags of the Asian country will reopen its doors on Monday, after they remained closed since last January 23 on the occasion of the celebration of the Chinese New Year. Experts assume that the session will be very volatile in the stock market and with this measure they aim to mitigate the impact on the companies most affected by the health crisis.
Italy manages to isolate the coronavirus thanks to two patients
Italian scientists have announced that they have managed to isolate the coronavirus that causes Chinese pneumonia thanks to two admitted patients. The Find facilitates the task to develop a treatment and a vaccine.
Discarded the case of the child of Catalonia
The Public Health Agency of Catalonia has ruled out that the 8-year-oldboy from Wuhan (China) suspected of having the coronavirus has contracted the disease. The tests done this morning at the Hospital Clínic have been negative.
Spain rules out border closures
The director of the Coordination Center for Health Alerts and Emergencies of the Ministry of Health, Fernando Simón, has requested that there be no discriminatory attitudes against people from China and discards the closing of borders “unless last position if really necessary”.
“There is some concern in the population and certain discriminatory attitudes against people from China are coming to be,” Simon lamented Sunday at the press conference following the ministerial meeting for the evaluation and monitoring of the coronavirus.
Discarded 11 suspected cases
The director of the Center for Alerts and Emergencies of the Ministry of Health, Fernando Simón, had already begun his press conference when a possible new suspect has been known in Catalonia. Although he does not know the case, he has stressed that in Wuhan they have been in quarantine for 10 days, so if the child comes from there, it is more likely to be affected by the flu , which generates many more infected than the coronavirus both in China and throughout the northern hemisphere, that by the new pneumonia of Wuhan.
The way to proceed in suspicious cases is that from the hospital a sample is sent to the Carlos III institute, which is in charge, in a few hours, in determining whether or not it suffers from coronavirus. In Spain, at least 11 suspected cases have already been ruled out.
The German, practically without symptoms
The director of the Center for Alerts and Emergencies of the Ministry of Health, Fernando Simón, explained about the positive case, the German tourist, that “everything is going well, practically has no symptoms.”
A search has been made and all contacts have been identified except those on the plane, but it is believed that as there were six German tourists they traveled all together, so it is not thought that there is an excessive risk. It is a reduced number of contacts and the majority of low risk. Only one of them, Simón points out, is considered an extreme contact and has been placed in self-quarantine.
An 8 year old boy, a possible case in Catalonia
The Public Health Agency of Catalonia investigates a suspected case of coronavirus that meets both criteria (clinical and epidemiological). This is an 8 year old boy from Wuhan (China).
Agency sources have explained through their Twitter account that the tests that will be performed in the epidemiological surveillance laboratory “will finally rule out or confirm the case.”
China prohibits funerals
Those killed by the coronavirus cannot be buried wherever their relatives want or have a farewell ceremony, after the Chinese government today issued a strict protocol for the treatment of corpses, as part of its efforts to control the outbreak.
The remains of the deceased infected by the new coronavirus should be buried in a designated funeral home and near where they are , will not be transported between different regions and will not be preserved by burial or other means, says a protocol issued by the National Health Commission , the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Minister of Public Security.
Funeral traditions such as farewell ceremony is prohibited and the bodies must be disinfected and placed in a bag sealed by medical workers and cannot be opened after sealing.
First killed by the coronavirus outside of China
A man of Chinese nationality died yesterday in the Philippines as a result of pneumonia caused by the Wuhan coronavirus, the first death by this pathogen that occurs outside the borders of China. The deceased is a 44-year-old man who entered the San Lázaro Hospital in Manila on January 25. It was the couple of the 38-year-old Chinese woman who had so far been the only confirmed case in the Philippines, where there are four other suspects.
304 dead and 14,380 infected
The number of deaths from the new coronavirus causing Wuhan pneumonia in China has risen today to 304 (45 more than Saturday),while the number of infected in Chinese territory stands at 14,380 (2,590 more than the day before) ), according to the daily report of the Chinese National Health Commission.
Saturday, February 1
The plane with 350 Europeans who were in Wuhan delays its arrival in Marseille
The Portuguese plane that will repatriate 350 citizens of various European nationalities from the Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus, has been delayed due to delays in several authorizations and is expected to arrive in Marseille on Sunday.
The aircraft, an Airbus 380 of the Portuguese company Hi Fly, chartered by the European Union, already has everything ready to leave tonight from Wuhan after having accumulated several delays that have complicated the repatriation plan, started on Thursday morning when it took off from the Portuguese city of Beja.
He made a first stop in Paris to pick up a team of doctors and health experts, and it was expected that from there he would continue immediately to Vietnam, the last stage of his route to Wuhan, but the delay in receiving authorization from China for Europeans to leave The country delayed the plans.
The flight ended up leaving the French capital on Friday night, and in Vietnam accumulated a new delay this Saturday, this time because the air connection between this country and China is interrupted by the coronavirus and an extra authorization had to be achieved.
Once these problems are overcome, the Portuguese media maintain that the Portuguese flight takes off tonight from Wuhan with 350 people “of different nationalities”, including 17 Portuguese, without the Portuguese government wanting to confirm arrival times by, they argue, prudence.
The Portuguese Foreign Minister, Augusto Santos Silva, has simply said, at the insistence of journalists, that is the operation “is going well,” and has refused to give details that could “harm the operation.”
Despite this reservation, the media insist that it will arrive in Marseille this Sunday, and from there the Portuguese will follow their country in an Air Force plane
Russia suspends travel without a visa for tourists to China and from China
Russia has announced that it was suspending travel without a visa for tourists to and from China to help contain the outbreak of a new coronavirus that emerged in China. A bilateral visa-free regime for tourist groups agreed in 2000 will be suspended as of February 2, according to a government decree. Russia will also temporarily stop accepting and issuing documents for work visas to Chinese citizens.
Russia reported its first two cases of coronavirus on Friday and restricted direct flights to China, its main trading partner. The Russian army will begin evacuating Russian citizens of China due to the outbreak.
First case of coronavirus on the east coast of the US, the eighth in the country
The health authorities of the United States reported on Saturday the first case of coronavirus on the east coast of the country, a man from Boston (Massachusetts) who has become the eighth infected in the North American country.
This is a man between 20 and 30 years old who lives in Boston and recently traveled to the Chinese province of Wuhan, the main focus of the coronavirus outbreak, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health said in a statement.
The young man “sought medical attention shortly after returning to Massachusetts,” has been “isolated since then and will continue to be so” until he receives contrary orders from the authorities, who have located “his few close contacts” and are monitoring them in case they exhibited ” symptoms, “notes the note.
“The risk (of contracting the coronavirus) for the general public remains low,” said the executive director of the Boston Public Health Commission, Rita Nieves, in the statement.
Nieves said that the infected man is “stable” and that health authorities feel prepared and “in a good state to respond to the situation.”
China extends holidays in the province of focus
The Hubei provincial government of China, whose capital is Wuhan, epicenter of the coronavirus epidemic, has extended the Lunar New Year vacations until February 13 to try to stop the coronavirus outbreak, the newspaper ‘Hubei’ reported.
Vic’s quarantined neighbor in Gómez Ulla refuses his family’s visit
Albert Aumatell, goalkeeper coach of Vic (Osona) who arrived from Wuhan last Friday along with 19 more people and who is isolated with the group in a plant of the Gómez Ulla hospital in Madrid, explains that he prefers not to see his person in person family during the quarantine to avoid exposing them to any risk .
