Coronavirus linked to rare inflammatory disease in children – here’s what we know
The UK Paediatric Intensive Care Society sent out an alert on April 27 about an increase in cases of severe COVID-19-related illness in children. Since then, 19 cases have been identified in children in the UK and 100 cases have been identified in five other countries (US, France, Italy, Spain and Switzerland). This is a new situation and only minimal information is […]
Coronavirus: many patients reporting neurological symptoms
As case numbers of COVID-19 continue to rise around the world, we are starting to see an increasing number of reports of neurological symptoms. Some studies report that over a third of patients show neurological symptoms. In the vast majority of cases, COVID-19 is a respiratory infection that causes fever, aches, tiredness, sore throat, cough and, in […]
Coronavirus: the puzzle of why the risk of death is greater for men and for the elderly
For COVID-19, age and sex appear to be strong predictors of who lives and who dies. The fatality rate for the disease is estimated to be 0.66%, according to data from China. In other words, 0.66% of people who are formally diagnosed with COVID-19, die. But the rate varies dramatically for different age groups, ranging from 0.0016% […]
Can I get the coronavirus twice?
There have been some cases, but is it too early to tell what is actually happening here? There have been a few stories in the press of people apparently being re-infected by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. These people reportedly became infected and hospitalised, and then were sent home once they’d tested negative for the virus. Then, days or […]
Coronavirus: will the UK really have highest death toll in Europe, as a US study suggests?
Within four months, the UK will have 66,314 fatalities from COVID-19, according to a recent report from the University of Washingon’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME). This would result in the UK having the highest number of fatalities out of any country in Europe – according to the report, more than Italy (a total of […]
Coronavirus: Why is Germany’s fatality rate so low?
Germany has received a great deal of attention for having a lower death rate for COVID-19 than most comparable European countries. A simple explanation for the low case-fatality rate in Germany is that the country has been testing more people, so they have more confirmed cases for the same number of fatalities. In many countries, only high-risk […]
Coronavirus: what the 2009 swine flu pandemic can tell us about the weeks to come
The first documented case of COVID-19 is thought to have appeared on December 1 2019 in Wuhan, China. Four months later, the world is in the middle of a pandemic with little idea of what comes next. Yet this is not the first pandemic to occur in recent years. On March 17 2009, the first case […]
Why are there so few coronavirus cases in Russia and Africa?
Since the COVID-19 pandemic began in Wuhan, China in December 2019, we have seen the virus spread to over 160 countries. Several countries have experienced large outbreaks, including China, South Korea, Italy, Iran, Spain and France, with the US and UK seeing rapidly increasing numbers. But most countries in the world have reported very few to no […]
A Clear Call for Government Action
The editors of Nature have recently published an excellent and clear discussion of the three things governments around the world need to do in order to combat the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic: – “Follow the World Health Organization’s advice”. As the WHO Director-General has said, “you can’t fight a virus if you don’t know where it […]
Coronavirus: Can herd immunity really protect us?
The UK government recently enacted its second phase of response to the COVID-19 pandemic: “delay”. According to ITV journalist Robert Peston, the government’s strategy to minimise the impact of COVID-19 “is to allow the virus to pass through the entire population so that we acquire herd immunity, but at a much delayed speed so that those […]
