It seems like the ongoing Wuhan coronavirus (2019-nCoV) outbreak in China could make things worse.
Some infectious disease specialists have been warning that it may no longer be viable to contain the new mysterious coronavirus circulating in China. They said if we fail to stop the spread in China, the virus could spread across the globe and may join the list of respiratory viruses that affect people.
Dr. Allison McGeer, a Canadian-based infectious disease expert, said, “The more we learn about it, the greater the possibility is that transmission will not be able to be controlled with public health measures.”
If that is the case, she said, “We’re living with a new human virus, and we’re going to find out if it will spread around the globe.”
Dr. McGeer contracted severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in 2003 and helped Saudi Arabia control several outbreaks of Middle East respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus (MERS).
She explained that it is impossible to predict the impact of the spread at this moment because the real severity of the outbreak is still unclear. However, she noted that the virus would pose a significant challenge to medical facilities.
In the United States, public health officials said they have reported five cases of 2019-nCoV so far, with the first cases reported in Orange County. In China, the virus has affected more than 2,750 people and killed over 80 so far.
Ma Xiaowei, China’s Health Minister, warned that 2019-nCoV is becoming more transmissible and the nation was entering a “crucial stage.”
Experts said that China’s actions of sealing off certain parts of the nation and putting millions into quarantine may not be enough to stop the spread.
Infectious disease epidemiologist Neil Ferguson from Imperial College London said, “Despite the enormous and admirable efforts in China and around the world, we need to plan for the possibility containment of this epidemic isn’t possible.”
Ferguson told The Guardian there could be more than 100,000 coronavirus cases in China. He said, “Almost certainly many tens of thousands of people are infected.”
On Sunday, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced a donation of $10 million in an effort to stop the virus.
Also, WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus tweeted he will be traveling to Beijing to meet with Chinese health officials to offer support and get more details about the ongoing outbreak.
The WHO has not yet declared the outbreak a “global health emergency,” though Dr. Tedros considered the spread of the new virus a crisis for China and a health risk to other countries.
2019-nCoV belongs to the same class of the viruses that caused the SARS and MERS outbreak in the past.
Dr. Nancy Messonnier from CDC said the transmission of the coronavirus within the United States could be on the horizon. She told STAT, “We’re leaning far forward. And we have been every step of the way with an aggressive stance to everything we can do in the U.S. And yet those of us who have been around long enough know that everything we do might not be enough to stop this from spreading in the U.S.”
“In hours where I’m feeling optimistic I think about the fact that none of the other countries, including the U.S., have seen significant sustained chains of transmission,” said Dr. Messonnier said. “But that doesn’t mean that it’s not coming.”
