Repercussions of the Covid-19 virus in human society: a short note

doi:10.15406/mojph.2020.09.00329

MOJ

eISSN: 2379-6383

Public Health

Short Communication Volume 9 Issue 3

Repercussions of the Covid-19 virus in human society: a short note

Maria A Grácio,

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António J Santos Grácio

Institute of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, New University of Lisbon, Portugal

Correspondence: Maria A Grácio, Institute of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, New University of Lisbon, Junqueira Street 100, 1348-008 Lisboa, Portugal, Tel +35121365260

Received: May 08, 2020 | Published: June 24, 2020

Citation: Grácio MA, Grácio AJS. Repercussions of the Covid-19 virus in human society.. a short note. MOJ Public Health . 2020;9(3):89?90. DOI: 10.15406/mojph.2020.09.00329

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Keywords

covid-19, coronavirus disease, public health, epidemiological, testimony

Introduction

The current Coronavirus (COVID-19) disease is a worldwide problem which is present in humans, principally adults. The effects of this disease at the individual and social levels are preoccupying families and health services throughout the world.

Here, we present a short note on COVID-19, with the objective of contributing to:

Divulgation of the knowledge about epidemiological characteristics of COVID-19 disease;
The history of COVID-19, with our testimony.

Thus, we present:

Contribution to the divulgation of the knowledge about epidemiological characteristics of COVID-19 disease

From our previous study we emphasize: an outbreak described in Zhang Y, et al., 2020¹ it was an outbreak of pneumonia of unknown cause that was identified in Wuhan, China in December 2019. On 31 December 2019, WHO was informed of a cluster of cases of pneumonia of unknown cause detected in Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China.² A new coronavirus was identified as the causal agent by the Chinese Authorities, and it is considered as responsible for the spread of the COVID-19.

Since then, human cases have been reported by almost all countries around the world, and the COVID-19 virus has been declared, by the WHO, to be already pandemic. The numbers of this outbreak are impressive:

A total of 72,324 patient records - 44,672 (61.8%) confirmed cases;
16,186 (22,4%) suspected cases;
10,567 (14,6 %) clinically diagnosed cases (Hubei Province only);
889 asymptomatic cases (1.2%) - contributed data for the analysis;
Among confirmed cases, most were aged 30-79 years (86.6%), diagnoses in Hubei (74.7%), and considered mild (80.9%);
A total of 1,023 deaths occurred among those confirmed with the disease giving an overall fatality rate of 2.3%;
COVID-19 spread outwards from Hubei Province sometime after December 2019, and by February 11, 2020, 1,386 counties across all 31 provinces were affected and a total of 1,716 health workers have become infected and 5 have died (0.3%)

Conclusion: the COVID-19 epidemic has spread very quickly taking only 30 days to expand from Hubei to the rest of Mainland China. On the other hand, the WHO declared the outbreak to be a Public Health Emergency of International concern on 30th January 2020, and recognised it as a pandemic on 11th March 2020.^3,4 As of 27th April 2020, more that 2.99 million cases of COVID-19! have been reported in 185 countries and territories, resulting in more than 207.000 deaths. More than 876,000 people recovered from the infection.⁵

History of the COVID -19

With our testimony, in Portugal, a pandemic of COVID-19 started on 2 March 2020. Then, the human community was compelled to change several of their individual and social conducts, in this short note, we present some of those changes, which we have testified from the balcony of our home in Lisbon-Portugal. In this context, we have testified:

Changes in traffic: commercial and individual transport was reduced substantially. Entrances and exits;
Both entrances and exits of aeroplanes were cancelled;
many windows in the vicinity were closed and their residents have left Lisbon, principally families with children;
A distance of about 1 to 1.5 m was maintained between individuals that were walking in their street and many parking spaces have been vacated.

In conclusion: All these repercussions of COVID-19 in human communities show that actually the human communities are living in very difficult times. We hope that the scientists working on the development of a vaccine and a treatment for COVID -19 have success to end the nightmare COVID. Our recommendations are:

Maintenance of the use of a mask when outside of home;
Maintenance of the distance between individuals;
Social precaution concerning embraces and kisses. Actually, both have to be avoided.