Coronavirus disease: a review of a new threat to public health

Abstract

In December 2019, several patients from Wuhan, China were admitted to hospitals with symptoms of pneumonia. As the number of patients presenting with similar symptoms started to rise, the causative agent was eventually isolated from samples. It was initially called the 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) and has been recently relabelled as severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2); the disease it causes has been named coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Over the next few weeks, the virus spread from Wuhan to affect different provinces in China and, after a few months, it is now present in 109 countries. As of March 10, 2020, there have been 113,702 confirmed cases globally, and 4,012 deaths have been registered. The World Health Organization (WHO) called COVID-19 a pandemic on March 11, 2020. There are multiple drug trials going on with some positive results. However, since no vaccine is available, the best way to combat the virus is by preventive methods.