Discontinuing home isolation

Discontinuing home isolation

Patients with confirmed 2019-nCoV infection should remain under home isolation precautions until the risk of secondary transmission to others is thought to be low. The decision to discontinue home isolation precautions should be made on a case-by-case basis, in consultation with healthcare providers and state and local health departments. Current information on 2019-nCoV is limited; thus, home precautions are conservative and based on general recommendations for other coronaviruses, like Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS).

Monitor your symptoms

Monitor your symptoms

Seek prompt medical attention if your illness is worsening (e.g., shortness of breath or difficulty breathing). Before seeking care, call your healthcare provider and tell them that you have, or are being evaluated for, 2019-nCoV infection. Put on a facemask before you enter the facility. These steps will help the healthcare provider’s office to keep other people from getting infected or exposed. Ask your healthcare provider to call the local or state health department. Persons who are placed under active monitoring or facilitated self-monitoring should follow instructions provided by their local health department or occupational health professionals, as appropriate.

Avoid sharing personal household items

Avoid sharing personal household items

You should not share dishes, drinking glasses, cups, eating utensils, towels, or bedding with other people in your home. After using these items, they should be washed thoroughly with soap and water.

Clean your hands

Clean your hands

Wash your hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds. If soap and water are not available, clean your hands with an alcohol-based hand sanitizer that contains at least 60% alcohol, covering all surfaces of your hands and rubbing them together until they feel dry. Soap and water should be used preferentially if hands are visibly dirty. Avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth with unwashed hands.

Cover your coughs and sneezes

Cover your coughs and sneezes

Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw used tissues in a lined trash can and wash your hands with soap and water for at least 20 seconds. If soap and water are not available, immediately clean your hands with an alcohol-based hand sanitizer that contains at least 60% alcohol, covering all surfaces of your hands and rubbing them together until they feel dry. Soap and water should be used preferentially if hands are visibly dirty.

Wear a facemask

Wear a facemask

You should wear a facemask when you are around other people (e.g., sharing a room or vehicle) and before you enter a healthcare provider’s office. If you are not able to wear a facemask (for example, because it causes trouble breathing), then people who live with you should not stay in the same room with you, or they should wear a facemask if they enter your room.

Call ahead before visiting your doctor

Call ahead before visiting your doctor

If you have a medical appointment, call the healthcare provider and tell them that you have or may have 2019-nCoV infection. This will help the healthcare provider’s office take steps to keep other people from getting infected or exposed.

Separate yourself from other people in your home

Separate yourself from other people in your home

As much as possible, you should stay in a specific room and away from other people in your home. Also, you should use a separate bathroom, if available.

Stay home except to get medical care

Stay home except to get medical care

You should restrict activities outside your home, except for getting medical care. Do not go to work, school, or public areas. Do not use public transportation, ride-sharing, or taxis.

Diagnosis and treatment

Diagnosis and treatment of Corona

Doctors can test their patients for coronavirus infections by analyzing respiratory specimens and serum isolated from their blood, according to the CDC. The CDC has developed an equivalent diagnostic test for the novel coronavirus, but its accuracy and specificity for the virus are still being verified. Once confirmed, diagnostic kits will be distributed to health care facilities in the U.S. and abroad, according to a CDC news conference in January 2019.

There are no available treatments for any human coronavirus, according to the CDC. Those who catch a common coronavirus usually recover on their own and can ease the process by taking pain and fever medications, using a humidifier, taking hot showers, drinking plenty of fluids and staying home to rest. Similar regimens are used to relieve the symptoms of more severe coronavirus infections.

Several existing antiviral medications, originally intended to treat Ebola and malaria, may show some efficacy against the novel coronavirus, Live Science previously reported. These medications disable viruses by interfering with their attempts to replicate in host cells. Another class of drug, called "protease inhibitors," also shows promise against coronaviruses and helps to alert the immune system to viral invaders. 

As of February 2019, no federally approved vaccines exist to prevent coronavirus infections. 

Scientists developed a candidate vaccine for SARS during the pandemic of that virus, and a potential MERS vaccine recently performed well in preliminary clinical trials, but neither of these has hit the market. Research groups around the world are now racing to develop a vaccine for the novel coronavirus; the CDC aims to have such a vaccine ready for clinical trials within three months. If and when a vaccine is developed, however, health officials will have to evaluate how the outbreak has evolved before conducting further tests and eventually administering the vaccine. 

Symptoms of Corona Virus

Symptoms of Corona Virus

In humans, coronaviruses typically cause a respiratory infection with mild to severe flu-like symptoms, but the exact symptoms vary depending on the type of coronavirus. 

The four common human coronaviruses can cause people to develop a runny nose, headache, cough, sore throat and fever, according to the CDC. In a subset of individuals, including those with cardiopulmonary disease or a weakened immune system, the viral infection can progress to a more severe lower-respiratory infection such as pneumonia or bronchitis. 

In comparison, severe MERS and SARS infections often progress to pneumonia. Other symptoms of MERS include fever, coughing and shortness of breath, while SARS can cause fever, chills and body aches. SARS had a mortality rate of 9.6% in the early 2000s outbreaks, according to The New York Times, while MERS has an estimated mortality rate between 30% and 40%, the CDC noted. 

The novel coronavirus causes symptoms similar to those of other coronaviruses, triggering fever, cough and difficulty breathing in most patients. Rarer symptoms include dizziness, nausea, vomiting and a runny nose. As of February 2019, scientists estimate the 2019-nCoV mortality rate at 2%, although that figure may be somewhat skewed by the severity of the cases studied so far. As more mild cases of the infection are accounted for, the estimated mortality rate may fall. 

Causes of Corona Virus

Causes of Corona Virus

All coronaviruses sport spiky projections on their outer surfaces that resemble the points of a crown, or "corona" in Latin, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Seven known coronaviruses can infect humans, including the novel coronavirus identified in 2019. 

Beneath a coronavirus's pronged exterior lies a round core shrouded in proteins and a "greasy" membrane, Jan Carette, an associate professor of microbiology and immunology at the Stanford University School of Medicine, told Live Science in an email. The core contains genetic material that the virus can inject into vulnerable cells to infect them. So-called spike proteins extend from within the core to the viral surface and allow the virus to "recognize and latch onto" specific cells in the body, Carette said. 

"When the spike engages its receptor [on a host cell], a cascade is triggered, resulting in the merger of the virus with the cell," he added. This merger allows the virus to release its genetic material and hijack the cell's internal machinery. "Once this happens, the virus sheds its coat and turns the cell into a factory that starts churning out new viruses."

Several coronaviruses utilize animals as their primary hosts and have evolved to infect humans, too. Precursors to both SARS and MERS coronaviruses appear in bats. The SARS virus jumped from bats to civets (small, nocturnal mammals) on its way into people, while MERS infected camels before spreading to humans. Evidence suggests that the novel coronavirus also jumped from bats to humans after passing through an intermediate carrier, although scientists have not yet identified the infectious middleman creature.

The four most common human coronaviruses — named 229E, NL63, OC43 and HKU1 — did not jump from animals to humans but rather utilize humans as their natural hosts, according to the CDC. These human-borne coronaviruses "have presumably evolved to maximize spread amongst the population rather than pathogenicity," meaning the viruses may opt to maximize their spread rather than harm their human host, Carette said. This may explain why coronaviruses that are transmitted from animals seem to cause more-severe diseases in humans, but the idea remains speculative, he added.

Coronaviruses can be transmitted between humans through respiratory droplets that infected people expel when they breathe, cough or sneeze. A typical surgical mask cannot block out the viral particles contained in these droplets, but simple measures — such as washing your hands, disinfecting frequently touched surfaces and objects, and avoiding touching your face, eyes and mouth — can greatly lower your risk of infection.

The viruses generally cannot survive for more than a few hours on surfaces outside a human host, but people can pick up a coronavirus from a contaminated surface for a short window of time, Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the Center for the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said during a CDC news conference in early 2019. Scientists don't yet know how long the novel coronavirus can survive outside a host.

Prevention of CORONA Virus.

Prevention

There is currently no vaccine to prevent 2019-nCoV infection. The best way to prevent infection is to avoid being exposed to this virus. However, as a reminder, CDC always recommends everyday preventive actions to help prevent the spread of respiratory viruses, including:

• Avoid close contact with people who are sick.
• Avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth with unwashed hands.
• Stay home when you are sick.
• Cover your cough or sneeze with a tissue, then throw the tissue in the trash.
• Clean and disinfect frequently touched objects and surfaces using a regular household cleaning spray or wipe.
• Follow CDC’s recommendations for using facemask.
  • CDC does not recommend that people who are well wear facemask to protect themselves from respiratory viruses, including 2019-nCoV.
  • Facemask should be used by people who show symptoms of 2019 novel coronavirus, in order to protect others from the risk of getting infected. The use of facemasks is also crucial for health workers and people who are taking care of someone in close settings (at home or in a health care facility).
• Wash your hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds, especially after going to the bathroom; before eating; and after blowing your nose, coughing, or sneezing.
  • If soap and water are not readily available, use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer with at least 60% alcohol. Always wash hands with soap and water if hands are visibly dirty.

For information about handwashing, see CDC’s Handwashing website

For information specific to healthcare, see CDC’s Hand Hygiene in Healthcare Settings

These are everyday habits that can help prevent the spread of several viruses. CDC does have specific guidance for travelers.

What is CORONA Virus?

Coronavirus

Coronaviruses (CoV) are a large family of viruses that cause illness ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS-CoV) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS-CoV). A novel coronavirus (nCoV) is a new strain that has not been previously identified in humans. 

Coronaviruses are zoonotic, meaning they are transmitted between animals and people.  Detailed investigations found that SARS-CoV was transmitted from civet cats to humans and MERS-CoV from dromedary camels to humans. Several known coronaviruses are circulating in animals that have not yet infected humans. 

Common signs of infection include respiratory symptoms, fever, cough, shortness of breath and breathing difficulties. In more severe cases, infection can cause pneumonia, severe acute respiratory syndrome, kidney failure and even death. 

Standard recommendations to prevent infection spread include regular hand washing, covering mouth and nose when coughing and sneezing, thoroughly cooking meat and eggs. Avoid close contact with anyone showing symptoms of respiratory illness such as coughing and sneezing.