Can I Get Coronavirus??

What is this new virus that everyone is talking about where everyone seems to be dying? An outbreak occurred in Wuhan, China in early December, causing a major stir up. Coronavirus has already spread around the world, infecting more than 12,000 people, and killing 250. It must be serious, because schools are closing, flights are canceling, and Wuhan City is basically shut down. Not much is yet known about the virus, but its slowly spreading to the United States, which means we should be worried.

Coronavirus seems to non-lethal, unless the one infected is young, old, or immunocompromised. Before the infection becomes too dangerous, the symptoms appear as cold or flu symptoms, which may be a reason that it has spread so drastically. This includes cough, fever, and shortness of breath, leading to respiratory problems, and then kidney failure and death. When the symptoms are nonexistent or very minimal, people are still active in their day to day lives, just like at the seafood market in Wuhan, where it believed to originate. There is a lot of skepticism about the transmission at the moment because coronaviruses begin in animals, but usually do not infect humans, but the 2019-nCoV did.

Coronavirus is a zoonosis, coming from a large family originating in camels, cattle, cats, and bats. If the first infection began at the seafood market, it was most likely in a food, infecting someone, starting the person-person contact chain. Coronavirus is a respiratory infection that can lead to bronchitis and pneumonia causing major problems, leading to death. Because it is new and research is still being done to learn more about it, there is not known cure or treatment yet, but prevention should be put into place before more people get infected. Because it causes infection with direct contact through sneezing and coughing, you need to always wash your hands, sneeze and cough into a tissue, and if you feel sick stay at home. You should avoid large crowds and anywhere you think you have the chance of getting sick.