Coronavirus outbreak appears to level off in China as US and other countries grapple with rise in new cases
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has now confirmed 18 new coronavirus cases over the weekend, bringing the total tally to 53 in the US.
All of the new cases were among people rescued from quarantine: 36 from the cruise ship named Diamond Princess and three from China. The number of positive cases in the country, however, has remained constant at 14 since Friday, including eight in California, two in Illinois, and one each in Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Washington state and Arizona.
On Friday, the CDC had confirmed 35 infected cases, of which 14 were within the country and 21 cases from among the repatriated Americans.
In Texas, reports suggest, health authorities have confirmed six cases among those repatriated, up from two on Friday, February 21. All six patients are being treated. Currently, over 150 people from the cruise ship have been placed under quarantine at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland.
“Because the passengers on the Diamond Princess were in a close setting where there has been a significant spread of COVID-19, they are considered at high-risk for infection and we expect to see additional confirmed cases among this group,” said CDC spokeswoman Kate Grusich.
“[L]et’s be clear, the most dangerous, damaging infectious disease is hysteria and so what we’re trying to do is make sure we have a compassionate human response to a crisis that’s happening,” San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg, said at a news conference.
The White House has also taken up steps to contain the virus spread. "Today, the Administration is transmitting to Congress a $2.5 billion supplemental funding plan to accelerate vaccine development, support preparedness, and response activities and to procure much-needed equipment and supplies,” said White House budget office spokeswoman Rachel Semmel.
Globally, the coronavirus disease or COVID-19 has sickened 80,147 people and killed over 2,699 people.
(AP Photo/Eric Risberg)
CDC surveillance
A recent report suggested that about two-thirds of coronavirus cases may have gone unreported, in part due to weak surveillance. It also does not help that some people infected with the virus might not show symptoms such as fever or cough.
To catch such undetected cases spreading within the country, CDC is ramping up its surveillance. It has tasked six public health labs in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, and New York City with tracking the general population for the new coronavirus this week.
Before bringing the surveillance network to life, the CDC has another important task: fixing its faulty coronavirus diagnostic tests. Earlier, the CDC had distributed these kits to several labs, and when a few of them found the tests were malfunctioning.
Once the tests are up and running, though, the existing system is well-equipped to start scanning for the new coronavirus, says Peter Shult, director of the Communicable Disease Division in the Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene, which is one of three National Influenza Reference Centers in the US.
“The whole concept of having something emerging and being able to deal with it with existing infrastructure is what we did with the 2009 H1N1 pandemic. We have more capacity now, and more experience dealing with a novel event," Schult told Verge.
The CDC has been monitoring flu cases in the country, thanks to support from hundreds of public health labs. These labs test respiratory samples of patients suspected of the flu. And if the tests show positive results, the labs inform the CDC, helping them maintain a surveillance network.
The CDC said that it will track people who test negative for flu but show symptoms.
“As we learn more, and if we start detecting the virus, we can make this a more effective and cost-effective surveillance system. Or, if we test and finding nothing, it might mean there’s nothing there, or that we’re just not testing in the right areas. It’s something we’ll have to struggle with for months to come," Schult told Verge.
FDA monitors medical supplies coming in from China
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which routinely inspects imported products in China, had to hit pause after the US State Department’s travel advisory for China over the coronavirus outbreak. These inspections help the agency weed out unsafe products, however, this has not hindered "our efforts to monitor medical products and food safety," the FDA said in a press statement.
For now, the FDA has a few tools that can monitor the safety of imported products up their allay. These include import screening, examinations, sampling,and import alerts, the agency added.
According to them, over 60% of FDA-regulated products imported from China are medical devices and 20% are housewares such as food packaging. "We will continue to closely monitor the situation in China so that when the travel advisory is changed, we will be prepared to resume routine inspections as soon as feasible," they said.
Outbreaks outside Mainland China
China appears to be bouncing back: experts believe that coronavirus cases may be leveling off. The country has reported 508 new cases of confirmed infections and 71 deaths on Tuesday, February 25, morning. On the whole, as many as 77,658 people have tested positive with a death toll of 2,663.
The case fatality rate is between 2% and 4% inside the city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak and 0.7% outside of Wuhan, the WHO’s director-general, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a press briefing.
While reports suggest that conditions in China have been improving, the virus has emerged stronger in several countries, including Iran, Italy, and South Korea.
This “sudden increase in new cases” outside of the country is “deeply concerning,” the WHO’s director-general, Tedros said. “What we see is epidemics in different parts of the world, affecting countries in different ways and requiring a tailored response,” he added.
Things are not looking up for South Korea, the country with the second-highest infection numbers after China. In just a week, the country has witnessed a 15-fold increase. The number of positive cases has now touched 893. Nine people are dead in the country.
Italy has the highest COVID- 19 disease burden in Europe: 229 people have the disease and seven have died. The country had only three positive cases last week.
Most of the infections in Italy are concentrated in a town named Lombardy, from over 90 cases reported on February 24, the numbers have risen to 172.
“These rapid developments over the weekend have shown how quickly this situation can change,” the health commissioner for the European Union, Stella Kyriakides, said in Brussels. “We need to take this situation of course very seriously, but we must not give in to panic, and, even more importantly, to disinformation, she added.
Iran has emerged as another outbreak center, with 61 confirmed cases and 12 deaths. Also, Oman, Kuwait, Iraq, and Bahrain have all announced their first cases of the virus. Oman confirmed two after two Omani women returning from Iran tested positive.
Hong Kong and Taiwan have also reported new cases, with 81 cases and 30 cases, respectively. Japan has reported 160 cases and Singapore has confirmed the infection in 90 people.
Italy has witnessed strict quarantine measures, affecting about 100,000 people. But, according to Bruce Aylward of the WHO, these steps are not effective. Instead, he recommends isolating and treating those infected.
Aylward said countries should not let them "wander around and restart the transmission chains," which is what China did. “So I think the big message is: You can control this particular respiratory virus by using these measures. You don’t have to lock down cities is the big message from China in fact”, Aylward told CNN.
A promising treatment?
According to the WHO, a drug from Gilead Sciences has been showing a promise in treating patients affected with COVID-19.
"There is only one drug right now that we think may have real efficacy and that's remdesivir," Bruce Aylward, said at a press conference in Beijing.
Earlier, Gilead Sciences teamed up with the Chinese authorities to test its experimental drug against patients in Wuhan. The results of the two studies -- one in patients with severe disease and another in patients with a moderate disease -- will be out in April, according to Gilead Sciences spokesperson.
This unapproved drug named remdesivir was designed to treat the Ebola virus. It was also shown to be effective against MERS and SARS, both coronaviruses that are structurally similar to the new coronavirus but only in tests conducted in labs and on animals.