COVID-19, short for “coronavirus disease 2019,” is an infectious disease caused by a new virus. The disease causes respiratory illness (like the flu) with symptoms such as a cough, fever, and in more severe cases, difficulty breathing.

People may be sick with the virus for 1 to 14 days before developing symptoms. The most common symptoms of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) are fever, tiredness, and dry cough. Most people (about 80%) recover from the disease without needing special treatment.

More rarely, the disease can be serious and even fatal. Older people, and people with other medical conditions (such as asthma, diabetes, or heart disease), may be more vulnerable to becoming severely ill. COVID-19 has acquired the status of a Pandemic in the entire world.

Symptoms of COVID-19

People suffering from coronavirus disease may experience:

cough

fever

tiredness

difficulty breathing (severe cases)

Causes

COVID-19 first emerged in late 2019, when a mysterious illness was reported in Wuhan, China. The cause of the disease was soon confirmed as a new kind of coronavirus, and the infection has since spread to many countries around the world and become a pandemic.

On 11 February, the World Health Organization announced that the official name would be COVID-19, a shortened version of coronavirus disease 2019. The WHO refers to the specific virus that causes this disease as the COVID-19 virus.

This is not the formal name for the virus. The International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses calls it the “severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2”, or SARS-CoV-2, because it is related to the virus that caused the SARS outbreak in 2003. However, to avoid confusion with SARS the WHO calls it the COVID-19 virus when communicating with the public.

Early in the outbreak, the virus was called 2019-nCoV by the WHO. The virus is also often referred to as the novel coronavirus, 2019 coronavirus or just the coronavirus.

Types

The more aggressive type of virus was found to be prevalent in the early stages of the outbreak in Wuhan, the Chinese city where COVID-19 was first detected late last year. However, the frequency of this type of virus has since decreased from early January according to scientists. Researchers cautioned that data examined in the study was still “very limited.”

Diagnosis of coronavirus

As the world is struggling to contain the novel coronavirus outbreak, healthcare infrastructure and testing capacity have emerged as major issues.

On 11–12 February 2020, WHO organized a Forum to identify research gaps and priorities for COVID-19 in collaboration with the GloPID-R. One of the eight immediate research needs agreed upon as part of the Forum was to “mobilize research on rapid point of care diagnostics for use at the community level.” This was early recognition of the urgent need for access to accurate and standardized diagnostics for SARS-CoV-2 (the causative agent of COVID-19), which can be deployed in decentralized settings. An R&D Roadmap for COVID-19 was published in March 2020.

Treatment and Precautions

If you have mild symptoms, stay at home until you’ve recovered. You can relieve your symptoms if you:

Rest and sleep

Keep warm

Drink plenty of liquids

Use a room humidifier or take a hot shower to help ease a sore throat and cough

Stay safe and stay indoors because your health is most important!

If any patient has developed severe symptoms such as difficulty breathing, you will need to use medical equipment such as an oxygen cylinder, ventilator, as well as an oximeter. Check the Medical Equipment section of our website to order any of this equipment for your loved one or call Holistic Healthcare Services at UAN: 03 111 678 679 to talk to our healthcare providers.