Know And Understand Everything About Coronavirus

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Hey Everyone!,

Know And Understand Everything 

 About Coronavirus 

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There are now three presumptive cases of coronavirus confirmed in Toronto and B.C.

What you need to know about the coronavirus

The outbreak of a new coronavirus in China is continuing to spread, and so far two cases have been confirmed in Toronto.

While Ontario’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, Dr. David Williams, said the risk to the Canadian public is low, municipal and provincial agencies are working together to prevent further spread of the illness.

The virus has already infected more than 800 people and killed at least 26, most of them in China.
The new virus, known as Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), is concerning precisely because it’s new. “We are in the very early stages and some of the details and facts we would like to know are not quite available,” says Robert Kim-Farley, MD, professor-in-residence at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.

Also of concern is the emergence of potential super-spreaders—people who seem to be more infectious and cause more infections than experts would predict.

Here’s what you should know about the coronavirus, and the role super-spreaders can play in outbreaks.

What is a coronavirus?

Coronaviruses are a family of viruses that can cause various respiratory illnesses, including the common cold. According to a recent article in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), coronavirus accounts for 10 per cent to 30 per cent of all adult upper respiratory infections.

This group of viruses is actually found more often in animals, including pigs, chickens, ducks and wild birds, according to the Government of Ontario. “What usually happens is that the virus will infect an animal then evolve and infect humans, so there’s potential for human-to-human spread,” says Miriam A. Smith, MD, chief of infectious disease at Northwell Health’s Long Island Jewish Forest Hills in Queens, New York.

There are seven basic types of coronavirus that affect humans. Four usually cause mild illness. Three are more ominous and all jumped from animals, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the United States. One was severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), which originated in China. The other was Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), which appeared in Saudi Arabia in 2012. The third is the current outbreak.

Where did the current outbreak originate?

Epidemiologists have traced the current outbreak of illness to a busy seafood and poultry market in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei Province in Central China. According to the JAMA article, Chinese officials announced the outbreak on Dec. 31, 2019.

No one knows which animal might have been responsible for the outbreak, but interest is currently on snakes, says William Schaffner, MD, an infectious diseases specialist with Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee. There’s also some speculation about bats, which is intriguing, says Dr. Schaffner, because both MERS and SARS were ultimately linked to bats.

So far, the outbreak is still centred in Wuhan City, but has moved to other parts of China. In addition to the two cases in Canada and 50 in the United States, patients have been diagnosed in other areas of Asia, namely Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, Thailand, Singapore, and Vietnam, according to the Centre for Health Protection of the Department of Health of Hong Kong.

What are the symptoms?

Coronaviruses affect the respiratory system, so symptoms can be similar to the cold or flu. This can include cough, fever, sore throat, runny nose, headache and overall feeling of being unwell, reports the Government of Canada. But symptoms do vary with the current virus mainly showing up as fever, cough, and shortness of breath, says Dr. Messonier.

MERS caused respiratory symptoms (50 per cent to 89 per cent of patients needed help breathing through mechanical ventilation) but also gastrointestinal problems and kidney failure, according to the JAMA article. Like the current coronavirus, SARS patients had fever, cough, and shortness of breath, but some also had watery diarrhea. Up to a third of SARS patients needed mechanical ventilation. Some people with the Wuhan coronavirus have had pneumonia (in which the virus affects the lungs), says. Dr. Messonier.

How serious is the current virus?

Here’s a bit of good news: So far, the new coronavirus does not appear to be as virulent as SARS or MERS, says Dr. Schaffner. The fatality rate for MERS was 36 per cent, and it was 10 per cent for SARS, the JAMA authors stated. The fatality rate for the Wuhan coronavirus stands at about four per cent, says Dr. Messonier, although that will likely change. In general, the deaths have been in people with pneumonia—often the elderly or people who had an underlying medical condition.

“The virus obviously has the potential to kill people,” says Dr. Kim-Farley, who was on loan to the World Health Organization because of previous service as an employee of the CDC for 18 years.

How is the new coronavirus spread?

Scientists are still figuring this out.”The assumption is that the outbreak was initially based on exposure to a live animal market,” says Dr. Smith. “Now the virus appears to be spreading from human to human, but we don’t yet know how or how easily,” she says.

“It’s early days, but the assumption is that transmissibility is going to be somewhere between SARS and MERS,” says Wes Van Voorhis, MD, PhD, director of the Center for Emerging and Re-emerging Infectious Diseases (CERID) at the University of Washington. Although both of these coronaviruses had high mortality rates, SARS was easily transmittable while MERS did not spread as easily, says Dr. Schaffner.

In general, coronaviruses are spread from person to person through respiratory droplets—either through the air or if you touch a surface that has the virus on it, says Dr. Messonier. “Right now, we don’t know if this is how the Wuhan virus is spreading. We also don’t know if you have to be in close, face-to-face contact for it to spread, or if more casual contact is enough,” says Dr. Schaffner.

What is a “super-spreader”?

This term refers to a person (or animal) who can spread the virus more efficiently to other people. “Their cough and sneeze seem to be more effective,” says Dr. Kim-Farley.

The super-spreader label was first coined in 2005 by doctors investigating a SARS outbreak: They used it to describe certain people with the virus who infected an unexpectedly high number of others, forcing epidemiologists to redo their models of expected transmission. Researchers have also found super-spreaders in outbreaks of the MERS, Ebola, and Marburg viruses, among others.

Doctors may have identified a potential super-spreader in the current outbreak: A patient in Wuhan infected 15 healthcare workers in a hospital—which would certainly count as a super-spreader, says Dr. Schaffner. Still, super-spreaders are relatively rare in outbreaks, he adds.

“The assumption is that super-spreaders are a little different immunologically, especially that their innate immunity that helps control the virus,” says Dr. Van Voorhis, who is also director of the Biomedical Interventions Group, part of the Megacenter for Pandemic Diseases Preparedness and Global Health Security, which will be working on vaccines, treatments, and ways to diagnose the new virus. “Super-spreaders have higher virus levels, presumably shedding more virus.”

Bear in mind, though, that the supposed super-spreader in China was ill and in contact with healthcare workers before the virus had been recognized, says Dr. Kim-Farley. “The guard was down, so to speak,” he says.

Can doctors diagnose the virus?

Within two weeks of announcing the outbreak, scientists in China had identified the culprit as a coronavirus and posted the genetic sequence online. Thanks to that quick work, Ontario’s Ministry of Health can now investigate, complete lab tests and do case and contact management to prevent and control further spread of the infection.

Are there treatments or vaccines?

Right now there’s no specific treatment for the new coronavirus, although researchers are racing to develop one. In the meantime, patients are getting supportive care, such as making sure they’re getting enough oxygen and staying hydrated, says Dr. Kim-Farley,

To prevent the spread of the virus, hospitals are relying on isolation and quarantine. Isolation is when a patient with symptoms is put in a negative-pressure room in the hospital (the air pulls in when the door opens instead of out). Those who have been in contact with the virus and are at risk are kept in quarantine, likely staying at home and being monitored by a public health department.

Efforts are also underway to develop a vaccine, according to the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases (NFID).

What are health experts doing?

The World Health Organization convened an emergency meeting on January 22 but decided it was too early to declare a “Public Health Emergency of International Concern,” though members will continue to meet and re-evaluate the situation.

As of January 27, Ontario’s Ministry of Health is meeting with hospitals, paramedics and local public health units near Pearson International Airport to provide further information on federal border screening measures.

What are hospitals doing?

Many, if not most or all hospitals in Canada, have already implemented emergency preparedness measures.

What can you do to protect yourself and those around you?

Based on the information available now, you should take the same precautions you would take to avoid getting a cold, the flu, or any other infectious diseases year-round. The experts view the virus as a respiratory infection, so follow smart anti-infection practices that you would year-round: “Cover your cough and wash your hands regularly,” says Dr. Messonier.

If you do feel sick, avoid contact with other people and immediately call your doctor.


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Know And UnderstandThe Overall Benefits Of Having The Right Posture

This post may contain affiliate links, including Amazon.com(and affiliate Sites/Stores.)Any One Can Shop from this blog.Using links to these sites means I may earn a small percentage from  purchases made at no extra cost to you.

Hey Everyone!,

Know And Understand The

       Overall Benefits Of Having 

The

 Right  Posture 

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But posture-correcting gadgets probably aren’t the answer

Give this a try

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Stand with your head drooped and your shoulders rounded forward as though you’re playing a little old lady in a high school play. Try to take a few deep breaths.

Now stand with your head up, your neck straight, and your shoulders pulled back so that they’re in line with your chest. Again, take a few deep breaths. Notice how much easier it is to breathe when you’re standing up straight?

“Posture isn’t just about aesthetics; it’s about keeping the entire body functioning normally,” says Marilyn Moffat, a professor of physical therapy at New York University.

While many view good posture as a relic of some bygone and backward era — the kind of thing young women once learned in finishing school — experts say posture plays an important role in physical and psychological health.

Along with impairing breathing, poor posture makes it difficult for a person to turn their head or raise their arms above their head, Moffat explains. It also “compresses the inner abdominal organs,” she says, and strains a person’s spine in ways that, over time, can lead to back and neck pain.

Headaches are another concern. Craning your head forward all day long — a pose some experts refer to as “tech neck” because of its association with smartphone and computer use — can create chronic tension in the muscles of the neck and back, which can lead to headaches, says Wendy Katzman, a professor of physical therapy at the University of California, San Francisco. “Poor posture can also cause nerve problems and numbness and tingling in the arms and legs,” she says.On top of all this, a 2012 study from San Francisco State University linked poor posture to low mood. “We found that if people had a history of depression, slouching seemed to activate those memories and evoke feelings of hopelessness,” says Erik Peper, a professor at SFSU and first author of the study.

Some of the research on posture and mood is controversial. But Peper says that every thought and emotion seems to have a corresponding body activity — and triggers can work in both directions. Just as sadness or fatigue can cause a person’s posture to wilt, assuming a slouched or closed body position seems to sap some people’s energy or enthusiasm, he says. Some of his newest experiments have shown that if a person is stressed, sitting up straight, taking a deep breath, and engaging in helpful self-talk is much more effective than just engaging in self-talk.

A single visit to a physical therapist is invaluable.

Combine all this with the lamentable state of posture in the U.S., and there’s reason to worry about your carriage affecting your health. “Just watch people walking in the street nowadays,” Moffat says. “This forward-head position you used to see in 70- and 80-year-olds you see now in 20-year-olds.”

Tech use aside, Moffat says too much time spent sitting down — in a car, in front of the TV, etc. — can erode a person’s posture. “Sitting is the new smoking,” she says. “It’s the horrible disease of our century.”

To fend off some of the risks associated with poor posture, she recommends standing up every 20 or 30 minutes and taking a quick walk. Also, ask a friend to take a side photo of you standing or sitting in your normal, relaxed pose. “A lot of people don’t realize how bad their posture is until someone gives them a look,” she says.

Regular bouts of stretching and taking a moment to “realign” your head and shoulders are good ways to break up the “prolonged static postures” that lead to problems, Katzman says. She also recommends strength training moves that target the shoulders and back, such as rowing exercises.

But when it comes to some popular posture-correcting gadgets, such as those frequently featured in ads on social media, experts say there’s not much evidence backing their benefits. Some of Katzman’s own research has shown that giving people accurate feedback about their posture can be helpful, but not all commercial posture fixers succeed in this regard. “Some of the ones we tried didn’t give good feedback,” she says. “We would deliberately slouch and they wouldn’t give us any cues.”

Wearable braces also aren’t the best solution. “Braces offer support, which tends to make the muscles not work so well on their own,” Moffat says.

On the other hand, she says a single visit to a physical therapist is invaluable. “One visit can help you know what to do and how to do it and when to do it,” she says. After years or decades of slouching, many people don’t understand what proper posture even feels like. Again, a physical therapist can help you sort this out, she says.

“The good news is that there’s a lot of research showing you can improve your posture,” Katzman says. But the longer you wait, she adds, the more difficult this becomes.

Hope You Enjoyed Reading This.

“What Do You Think About How Does A Good Posture Benefit Your Health? Please Share your thoughts in the comments below as I learn just as much from you as you do from me!” 

Bye for Know

Sameer 

There’s more to that

If you’re looking for more,Please subscribe to my blog by clicking on Subscribe in a reader the icon or Subscribe via Email by submitting your email id on the side bar ;)

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