About novel coronavirus, experts predict the best and worst cases.

Authors: since the novel coronavirus pneumonia outbreak in Wuhan has been launched by the biological Tong Xiao Tong, the rising number of cases has been affecting everyone's heart every day Scientists all over the country and the world are trying to stop the spread of the virus According to nature, although key details such as the source and mode of transmission of the virus are still unknown, experts are predicting the best and worst according to the current information How many people will the virus infect? To control the novel coronavirus transmission, Wuhan issued a decision to seal the city in January 23rd However, the number of confirmed cases has been rising As of 24:00 on February 2, 31 provinces (autonomous regions, municipalities directly under the central government) and Xinjiang production and Construction Corps have reported 17205 confirmed cases and 21558 suspected cases, according to the website of the health commission Ben cowling, an epidemiologist at the University of Hong Kong, believes that at the best of times, the number of infections will decrease as control measures begin to work However, it is too early to say whether isolation and wearing of masks will work He said the virus had a incubation period (up to 14 days) longer than most controls According to another prediction model, in the worst case, the number of people infected in Wuhan may reach 190000 Scientists are particularly concerned about outbreaks outside China At present, the novel coronavirus has been spread to small local populations in Vietnam, Japan, Germany and the United States, but the relevant departments quickly isolated the affected people So far, there have been more than 100 cases outside China Will the virus persist? When the virus continues to spread in the community, people call it local The virus that causes chickenpox and flu is endemic in many countries, but people can control outbreaks by vaccinating and keeping sick people at home Now, whether the novel coronavirus will stay If the effort to contain it fails, it is likely to become a endemic disease Like flu, it kills every year as the virus spreads, until people develop a vaccine If the virus can be spread through infected but asymptomatic people, it will be more difficult to control its spread At present, there are several cases of asymptomatic infection, but it is not clear whether the asymptomatic or mild cases are common, and how infectious they are Ian Mackay, a virologist at the University of Queensland, said: "we may be facing a virus that has been with us for a long time, maybe forever." "If the control measures are effective and the transmission rate slows down, and each infected person can only infect one person at most, then the current epidemic will gradually decline," cowling said Will the virus change? Some researchers worry that China novel coronavirus will spread more effectively, and it will cause more diseases to spread among young people At present, the virus has caused serious disease and death, but mainly in the elderly, especially those who have diabetes and heart disease So far, the youngest case of death is a 36 year old Wuhan man, whose health status is unknown Kristian Anderson, an infectious diseases researcher at Scripps Research, is not worried that the virus will become more toxic He said that the virus will continue to mutate during its life cycle, but these mutations usually do not make the virus more toxic or cause more serious diseases "I can't think of any previous examples," he said When animal animal novel coronavirus infects humans from a host of animals (which may be a new coronavirus infecting humans), they may be under the pressure of choice to increase their survival rate in the new host, but this rarely affects the transmission of human diseases or viruses, Andersen said Most mutations are harmful or ineffective to the virus A 2018 study of SARS showed that mutations that persisted during the 2003 outbreak reduced the virulence of the virus How many people will be killed by the virus? During the outbreak, it is difficult to calculate the death rate of the virus (i.e the proportion of deaths of infected people), because new cases and death cases are constantly updated So far, 361 novel coronavirus cases have died in 17205 confirmed cases, and the mortality rate of the new coronavirus is estimated at 2-3% This is significantly lower than the SARS virus, which has a fatality rate of about 10% The novel coronavirus mortality rate may be reduced with the discovery of more mild and asymptomatic cases, MarkHarris, a virologist at University of Leeds, UK People are looking for novel coronavirus drugs and therapies The first confirmed novel coronavirus pneumonia in the United States has been widely used in the diagnosis of Remdesivir after using a new antiviral drug, Reed Two HIV drugs are also being tested, targeting proteins that help the coronavirus replicate In addition, some national research groups are also developing vaccines The number of deaths also depends on how the health system responds to large numbers of cases Giving patients fluids and a ventilator ensures that their immune system has enough body fluids and oxygen to fight the virus Sanjaya Senanayake, an infectious diseases expert at the Australian National University, said that China is setting up two new hospitals in Wuhan to accommodate infected people, but if the virus spreads to areas with limited resources, such as some parts of Africa, the local medical system may be in trouble A novel coronavirus infection in January 30th was reported by WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in Geneva The epidemic situation of pneumonia caused by the new coronavirus has become a public health emergency with international concern It is also known as the international public health emergency (PHEIC) His main concern is the potential for the virus to spread to countries with weaker health systems, which are ill prepared to deal with it If the virus spreads all over the world, the death toll will be considerable Adam Kamradt Scott, an expert at the University of Sydney, said that although the death rate of 2-3% is not as high as that of SARS, it is still very high for infectious diseases In 1918, the Spanish influenza caused about 1 billion people to be infected and 25-40 million people to die in the world, with a global mortality rate of about 2.5% He believes that China's novel coronavirus is different from that because it usually does not infect or kill healthy young people Reference: coronavirus outbreak: what's next