scholarly journals The Novel Coronavirus (nCoV) – A Worldwide Threat

Author(s):  
Július Rajčáni ◽  

This review aims to asses the data from recently published literature related to the novel Coronavirus (nCoV), which had been isolated in the automn of 2019. Similarly to the classical Coronavirus (cCoV) isolated nearly 18 years ago, the nCoV has also emerged in China, though in a different region of the same country. The majority of papers published in the current year 2020, clearly demonstrates the actual nature of the given topics. Despite of the unusual criteria used for information selection, all the collected data have turned up useful as the virion structure and its properties concerns. Neither were omitted the clinical signs of virus related disease(s) nor understanding the spread of any other pathological state(s) occurring in infected patients. Last but not least, the presented epidemiological data contribute to understanding the spread of nCoV in human community(ies).

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Heidi Luise Schulte ◽  
José Diego Brito-Sousa ◽  
Marcus Vinicius Guimarães Lacerda ◽  
Luciana Ansaneli Naves ◽  
Eliana Teles de Gois ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Since the novel coronavirus disease outbreak, over 179.7 million people have been infected by SARS-CoV-2 worldwide, including the population living in dengue-endemic regions, particularly Latin America and Southeast Asia, raising concern about the impact of possible co-infections. Methods Thirteen SARS-CoV-2/DENV co-infection cases reported in Midwestern Brazil between April and September of 2020 are described. Information was gathered from hospital medical records regarding the most relevant clinical and laboratory findings, diagnostic process, therapeutic interventions, together with clinician-assessed outcomes and follow-up. Results Of the 13 cases, seven patients presented Acute Undifferentiated Febrile Syndrome and six had pre-existing co-morbidities, such as diabetes, hypertension and hypopituitarism. Two patients were pregnant. The most common symptoms and clinical signs reported at first evaluation were myalgia, fever and dyspnea. In six cases, the initial diagnosis was dengue fever, which delayed the diagnosis of concomitant infections. The most frequently applied therapeutic interventions were antibiotics and analgesics. In total, four patients were hospitalized. None of them were transferred to the intensive care unit or died. Clinical improvement was verified in all patients after a maximum of 21 days. Conclusions The cases reported here highlight the challenges in differential diagnosis and the importance of considering concomitant infections, especially to improve clinical management and possible prevention measures. Failure to consider a SARS-CoV-2/DENV co-infection may impact both individual and community levels, especially in endemic areas.


Viruses ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (8) ◽  
pp. 1507
Author(s):  
Chao-Nan Lin ◽  
Kuan Rong Chan ◽  
Eng Eong Ooi ◽  
Ming-Tang Chiou ◽  
Minh Hoang ◽  
...  

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), a novel coronavirus in humans, has expanded globally over the past year. COVID-19 remains an important subject of intensive research owing to its huge impact on economic and public health globally. Based on historical archives, the first coronavirus-related disease recorded was possibly animal-related, a case of feline infectious peritonitis described as early as 1912. Despite over a century of documented coronaviruses in animals, the global animal industry still suffers from outbreaks. Knowledge and experience handling animal coronaviruses provide a valuable tool to complement our understanding of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. In this review, we present an overview of coronaviruses, clinical signs, COVID-19 in animals, genome organization and recombination, immunopathogenesis, transmission, viral shedding, diagnosis, treatment, and prevention. By drawing parallels between COVID-19 in animals and humans, we provide perspectives on the pathophysiological mechanisms by which coronaviruses cause diseases in both animals and humans, providing a critical basis for the development of effective vaccines and therapeutics against these deadly viruses.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Georgios D. Politis ◽  
Leontios Hadjileontiadis

AbstractFollowing the outbreak of the novel coronavirus SARS-Cov2 in Europe and the subsequent failure of national healthcare systems to sufficiently respond to the fast spread of the pandemic, extensive statistical analysis and accurate forecasting of the epidemic in local communities is of primary importance in order to better organize the social and healthcare interventions and determine the epidemiological characteristics of the disease. For this purpose, a novel combination of Monte Carlo simulations, wavelet analysis and least squares optimization is applied to a known basis of SEIR compartmental models, resulting in the development of a novel class of stochastic epidemiological models with promising short and medium-range forecasting performance. The models are calibrated with the epidemiological data of Greece, while data from Switzerland and Germany are used as a supplementary background. The developed models are capable of estimating parameters of primary importance such as the reproduction number and the real magnitude of the infection in Greece. A clear demonstration of how the social distancing interventions managed to promptly restrict the epidemic growth in the country is included. The stochastic models are also able to generate robust 30-day and 60-day forecast scenarios in terms of new cases, deaths, active cases and recoveries.


2021 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 18-26
Author(s):  
Zhilla Damanabad ◽  
Leila Valizadeh ◽  
Sadollah Yeghanedoost ◽  
Fariborz Roshangar

In late December 2019, Wuhan, China, became the center of an unknown outbreak of pneumonia that spread rapidly throughout China and around the world, including Iran, and the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the novel disease a public health emergency with global concern. Since the COVID-19 outbreak, many studies have been performed on epidemiological data and clinical signs in adults. However, coherent studies in this field are very rare in infants, and support and attention to infants in the pandemic situation should be doubled due to the weakness and underdevelopment of the neonatal immune system. Therefore, the present study aimed to review COVID-19 infection in infants in which there are discussions on topics such as diagnostic tests, clinical manifestations, recommendations on breastfeeding, the criteria for discharge, and family education in pandemic conditions. The literature review shows no existing evidence of COVID-19 placental transmission from mother to infant, and that all samples prepared from amniotic fluid, umbilical cord blood and breast milk in mothers with COVID -19 was negative for COVID-19 infection, and the clinical manifestations of COVID-19 were non-specific in infants, especially premature infants. Given that there is a limited number of births from a mother with COVID-19, and because the epidemiological and clinical pattern of COVID-19 in infants is unclear, this review study describes diagnostic tests, clinical manifestations, breastfeeding considerations, discharge criteria, and family education in the current understanding of COVID-19 infection in newborns and provides information for better management of SARS-CoV-2 infection in newborns.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Khondoker Nazmoon Nabi

In this paper, a new Susceptible-Exposed-Symptomatic Infectious-Asymptomatic Infectious-Quarantined-Hospitalized-Recovered-Dead (SEIDIUQHRD) deterministic compartmental model has been proposed and calibrated for describing the transmission dynamics of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). A calibration process is executed through the solution of an inverse problem with the help of a Trust-Region-Reflective algorithm, used to determine the best parameter values that would fit the model response. The purpose of this study is to give a tentative prediction of the epidemic peak for Russia, Brazil, India and Bangladesh which could become the next COVID-19 hotspots in no time. Based on the publicly available epidemiological data from late January until 10 May, it has been estimated that the number of daily new symptomatic infectious cases for the above mentioned countries could reach the peak around the beginning of June with the peak size of ≈15,774 symptomatic infectious cases in Russia, ≈26,449 cases in Brazil, ≈9,504 cases in India and ≈2,209 cases in Bangladesh. Based on our analysis, the estimated value of the basic reproduction number (R0) as of May 11, 2020 was found to be ≈4.234 in Russia, ≈5.347 in Brazil, ≈5.218 in India, ≈4.649 in the United Kingdom and ≈3.5 in Bangladesh. Moreover, with an aim to quantify the uncertainty of our model parameters, Latin hypercube sampling-partial rank correlation coefficient (LHS-PRCC) which is a global sensitivity analysis (GSA) method is applied which elucidates that, for Russia, the recovery rate of undetected asymptomatic carriers, the rate of getting home-quarantined or self-quarantined and the transition rate from quarantined class to susceptible class are the most influential parameters, whereas the rate of getting home-quarantined or self-quarantined and the inverse of the COVID-19 incubation period are highly sensitive parameters in Brazil, India, Bangladesh and the United Kingdom which could significantly affect the transmission dynamics of the novel coronavirus. Our analysis also suggests that relaxing social distancing restrictions too quickly could exacerbate the epidemic outbreak in the above mentioned countries.


2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-31

The genetic diversity of coronaviruses and their variability are provided by high frequency of recombination of their genomic RNA that assists spontaneous emergence of viruses with new characteristics, which potentially may be agents of novel extremely dangerous and exotic infectious diseases. In December 2019 – January 2020 the novel coronavirus disease, caused by SARS-CoV-2 virus, subsequently named COVID-19 (Corona Virus Disease 2019), was revealed in China. The aim of this work is to analyze the possible mechanism of COVID-19 outbreak and the properties of the possible etiological agent of the disease, SARS-CoV-2 virus. A comparison of zoonotic reservoirs of highly pathogenic human coronaviruses, agents of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) and SARS-CoV-2, as well as the clinical signs of the diseases, caused by them, are presented. The possible mechanism of epidemic outbreaks is considered. The chronology of COVID-19 outbreak (later escalated into a pandemic) from the beginning of December to the end of March, taxonomical and molecular-biological characteristics of ethiological agent of disease, SARS-CoV-2 virus, and its place on phylogenetic tree of coronaviruses are presented. The main directions of the struggle with the spread of the infection are considered


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Khondoker Nazmoon Nabi

Abstract In this paper, a new Susceptible-Exposed-Symptomatic Infectious-Asymptomatic Infectious-Quarantined-Hospitalized-Recovered-Dead (SEIDIUQHRD) deterministic compartmental model has been proposed and calibrated for interpreting the transmission dynamics of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). The purpose of this study is to give a tentative prediction of the epidemic peak for Russia, Brazil, India and Bangladesh which could become the next COVID-19 hotspots in no time by using a Trust-region-reflective (TRR) algorithm which one of the well-known real data fitting techniques. Based on the publicly available epidemiological data from late January until 10 May, it has been estimated that the number of daily new symptomatic infectious cases for the above mentioned countries could reach the peak around the beginning of June with the peak size of 15, 774 (95% CI, 13,814-17,734) symptomatic infectious cases in Russia, 26, 449 (95% CI, 23,489-29,409) cases in Brazil, 9, 504 (95% CI, 8,378-10,630) cases in India and 2,209 (95% CI, 1,878-2,540) cases in Bangladesh. As of May 11, 2020, incorporating the infectiousness capability of asymptomatic carriers, our analysis estimates the value of the basic reproduction number (R0) as of May 11, 2020 was found to be 4.234 (95% CI, 3.764-4.7) in Russia, 5.347 (95% CI, 4.737-5.95) in Brazil, 5.218 (95% CI, 4.56-5.81)in India, 4.649 (95% CI, 4.17-5.12) in the United Kingdom and 3.53 (95% CI, 3.12-3.94) in Bangladesh. Moreover, Latin hypercube sampling-partial rank correlation coeffcient (LHS-PRCC) which is a global sensitivity analysis (GSA) method is applied to quantify the uncertainty of our model mechanisms, which elucidates that for Russia, the recovery rate of undetected asymptomatic carriers, the rate of getting home-quarantined or self-quarantined and the transition rate from quarantined class to susceptible class are the most influential parameters, whereas the rate of getting home-quarantined or self-quarantined and the inverse of the COVID-19 incubation period are highly sensitive parameters in Brazil, India, Bangladesh and the United Kingdom which could signicantly affect the transmission dynamics of the novel coronavirus. Our analysis also suggests that relaxing social distancing restrictions too quickly could exacerbate the epidemic outbreak in the above-mentioned countries.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. S. M. Rubayet Ul Alam ◽  
M. Rafiul Islam ◽  
M. Shaminur Rahman ◽  
Ovinu Kibria Islam ◽  
M. Anwar Hossain

The novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, causes the unfathomable pandemic in the history of humankind. Bangladesh is also a victim of this critical situation. To investigate the genomic features of the pathogen, the first complete genome of the virus has very recently been published. Therefore, the long awaiting questions regarding the possible origin and typing of the strain(s) can now be answered. Here, we endeavor to mainly discuss the published reports or online-accessed data (results) regarding those issues and presented a comprehensive picture of the typing of the virus alongside the probable origin of the sub-clade containing Bangladeshi strain. Our observation suggested that this strain might have originated from the United Kingdom (UK) or other European countries epidemiologically linked to the UK. According to different genotyping classification schemes, this strain belongs to A2a clade under G major clade, is of B and/or L type, and is a SARS-CoV-2a sub-strain. The complete genome data will surely increase in the forwarding days in Bangladesh. However, a mass regional sequencing approach targeting the partial or complete genome can link the epidemiological data and may help in further clinical interventions.


Author(s):  
Ankita Sood ◽  
Ravi Goyal ◽  
Harshdeep Singh ◽  
Tapan Behl ◽  
Sandeep Arora ◽  
...  

: It is noticeable how the novel coronavirus has spread from the Wuhan region of China to the whole world, devastating the lives of people worldwide. All the data related to the precautionary measures, diagnosis, treatment, and even the epidemiological data are being made freely accessible and reachable in a very little time as well as being rapidly published to save humankind from this pandemic. There might be neurological complications of COVID-19 and patients suffering from neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease might have repercussions as a result of the pandemic. In this review article, we have discussed the effect of SARS-CoV-2 viral infection on the people affected with neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. It primarily emphasizes two issues, i.e., vulnerability to infection and modifications of course of the disease concerning the clinical neurological manifestations, the advancement of the disease and novel approaches to support health care professionals in disease management, the susceptibility to these diseases, and impact on the severity of disease and management.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Angélica Arcanjo ◽  
Jorgete Logullo ◽  
Camilla Cristie Barreto Menezes ◽  
Thais Chrispim de Souza Carvalho Giangiarulo ◽  
Mirella Carneiro dos Reis ◽  
...  

AbstractThe novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 causes COVID-19, a highly pathogenic viral infection threatening millions. The majority of the individuals infected are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic showing typical clinical signs of common cold. However, approximately 20% of the patients can progress to acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), evolving to death in about 5% of cases. Recently, angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) has been shown to be a functional receptor for virus entry into host target cells. The upregulation of ACE2 in patients with comorbidities may represent a propensity for increased viral load and spreading of infection to extrapulmonary tissues. This systemic infection is associated with higher neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio in infected tissues and high levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines leading to an extensive microthrombus formation with multiorgan failure. Herein we investigated whether SARS-CoV-2 can stimulate extracellular neutrophils traps (NETs) in a process called NETosis. We demonstrated for the first time that SARS-CoV-2 in fact is able to activate NETosis in human neutrophils. Our findings indicated that this process is associated with increased levels of intracellular Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) in neutrophils. The ROS-NET pathway plays a role in thrombosis formation and our study suggest the importance of this target for therapy approaches against disease.


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