Corona Virus Now Spreading

[aliceneko]

The death toll in the UK has risen from almost 1000 in one night:
Coronavirus latest news: UK death toll jumps 980 in 24 hours in biggest rise yet – more deadly than Spain’s worst day of crisis

 

[Katie M]

There are 536 cases in my state. I think the major cities have locked down, but people in more rural areas are still being blase about it. Mom says they probably think it'll never reach them.

 

[Jem]

I just want to know if I got this straight...
There is this new coronavirus strain that we can get infected with....but covid-19 is the term they use when they are referring to when you develop the possibly deadly pneumonia? It's still the same virus, not a secondary infection right, just that the symptoms worsened into the pneumonia?
Some sources use the terms interchangeably, some sources are more specific and some sources have made the distinction between the two terms, so I just want to clarify.

 

[Katie M]

I just want to know if I got this straight...
There is this new coronavirus strain that we can get infected with....but covid-19 is the term they use when they are referring to when you develop the possibly deadly pneumonia? It's still the same virus, not a secondary infection right, just that the symptoms worsened into the pneumonia?
Some sources use the terms interchangeably, some sources are more specific and some sources have made the distinction between the two terms, so I just want to clarify.

Coronavirus is the type of virus, and I think COVID-19 is the strain. I see people being diagnosed with mild COVID-19, without pneumonia.

 

[Willowy]

I believe COVID-19 (short for COronaVIrus Disease 2019) is the commonly-used name of the strain (proper name is SARS-CoV-2), whether you get a mild case or a severe case. It is a coronavirus, generically.

 

[Kieka]

I just want to know if I got this straight...
There is this new coronavirus strain that we can get infected with....but covid-19 is the term they use when they are referring to when you develop the possibly deadly pneumonia? It's still the same virus, not a secondary infection right, just that the symptoms worsened into the pneumonia?
Some sources use the terms interchangeably, some sources are more specific and some sources have made the distinction between the two terms, so I just want to clarify.

My understanding is...

COVID19 is the virus, it can cause significant and long term lung damage.

Pneumonia is a secondary infection to COVID19 that is bacteria driven. The bacteria is able to set in because the immune system and lungs were weakened by COVID19.

 

[Willowy]

Pneumonia is a secondary infection to COVID19 that is bacteria driven.

Is it? I'm not sure because they say antibiotics don't help, and I think they would if it were bacterial.

 

[Margret]

Good article: Processing Grief During a Pandemic, When Nothing Is Normal

Margret

 

[She's a witch]

I understand this differently... that CoViD 19 is a respiratory illness and it doesn’t equal to the virus. It’s caused by virus SARS Cov 2 (coronavirus) but they are not the same. And COVID 19 does not necessarily mean pneumonia.

 

[Jem]

Even with this article, it's somewhat confusing, but I think I get it.....sort of.
What is the difference between Covid-19 and coronavirus?
They refer to Covid-19 as the disease you get from coronavirus, which is why I thought it was the term used for the more severe symptoms (like pneumonia).
So in essence we have a Coronavirus. Which is called, in this case because it's a new strain a "novel coronavirus".
This "novel coronavirus" has been named SARS-CoV-2 - because it's very similar to the first SARS.
BUT because they wanted to eliminate confusion and what not, it has been coined Covid-19.

But what's still confusing is that Covid-19 is the term used in both of these sentences "The virus responsible for Covid-19" and "The Covid-19 virus", which in my head mean two different things. I have also seen/read "The Covid-19 disease" and "The Disease caused by Covid-19".


THIS is what happens when I have too much time on my hands...I think too much! LOL!

 

[Willowy]

OK, let's see if I got this, lol. Because the D stands for "disease", "COVID-19" refers to the illness caused by the virus. But the actual virus strain, in a petri dish just minding its virus-y business, is SARS-CoV-2.

But then that doesn't really make sense because SARS also refers to an illness: "severe acute respiratory syndrome". But that would leave the actual virus strain without a name. Poor little nameless virus strain .

 

[pearl99]

Covid-19 is the disease caused by the Novel Coronovirus- the novel coronavirus itself is officially named SARS-CoV-2- "severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2."
Covid-19 (the disease) can be with pneumonia, or not.

It's not always getting referred to accurately- reporters etc. just don't have the correct distinction. Any pneumonia can be caused by either bacteria OR a virus. So in this case antibiotics don't work on Covid-19 caused pneumonia, because antibiotics don't work against viruses.
Clear as mud, right ?

 

[pearl99]

OK, let's see if I got this, lol. Because the D stands for "disease", "COVID-19" refers to the illness caused by the virus. But the actual virus strain, in a petri dish just minding its virus-y business, is SARS-CoV-2.

But then that doesn't really make sense because SARS also refers to an illness: "severe acute respiratory syndrome". But that would leave the actual virus strain without a name. Poor little nameless virus strain .

The novel coronavirus is related to the first SARS virus, both are similar coronaviruses. So, it's SARS-CoV-2 since it's the second virus of 2 that are genetically similar.
I think the SARS one from 2003 is still called SARS since it was first named that?
Some days my brain hurts trying to get this straight LOL!

 

[Margret]

OK, let's see if I got this, lol. Because the D stands for "disease", "COVID-19" refers to the illness caused by the virus. But the actual virus strain, in a petri dish just minding its virus-y business, is SARS-CoV-2.

But then that doesn't really make sense because SARS also refers to an illness: "severe acute respiratory syndrome". But that would leave the actual virus strain without a name. Poor little nameless virus strain .

When I was in college, I took exactly one quarter of Greek, which I was terrible at. There were two reasons I had so much trouble with it:

1. I'm no good at memorizing.
2. I spent weeks trying to figure out how 1st, 2nd, and 3rd aorist were related -- i.e. how did 2nd aorist derive from 1st aorist, and how did 3rd aorist derive from 2nd aorist. (The answer is: They don't. "1st," "2nd," and "3rd" are just a convenient way to distinguish between the three forms.)

The problem was, I expected it all to make sense. I think perhaps you're making the same mistake here.

Margret

 

[KittyFriday]

Covid-19 is the disease caused by the Novel Coronovirus- the novel coronavirus itself is officially named SARS-CoV-2- "severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2."
Covid-19 (the disease) can be with pneumonia, or not.

It's not always getting referred to accurately- reporters etc. just don't have the correct distinction. Any pneumonia can be caused by either bacteria OR a virus. So in this case antibiotics don't work on Covid-19 caused pneumonia, because antibiotics don't work against viruses.
Clear as mud, right ?

This is my understanding too. I work processing research applications for my university. The amount of times I’ve had to type in SARS-CoV-2 (because so many are doing related research with the strain) is crazy. But job security I guess.

 

[Willowy]

I think the SARS one from 2003 is still called SARS since it was first named that?

I think so. But wouldn't SARS refer to the actual illness/"syndrome", not the virus itself? If it made sense, which, as previously pointed out, is not necessarily so.

 

[molly92]

About the nomenclature:

SARS-CoV-2 is the name of this virus. It is NOT a "strain." It is its own separate virus. COVID-19 is the name of the disease caused by the virus, regardless of severity. It's like HIV and AIDS: HIV is the virus, AIDS is the disease.

SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) is the name of the disease from 2003. The name of the virus is SARS-CoV-1.

Likewise, MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) is the disease, and it's virus' name is MERS-CoV.

Coronavirus refers to a group of viruses (including SARS-CoV-2, SARS-CoV-2, and MERS-CoV) that all have the same kind of genetic material and the same general shape, but there are many different coronaviruses.

The differences in naming is basically important for scientists and doctors when they are discussing these in detail and need different words to distinguish whether they're specifically referencing the virus or the disease. In every day discussion, these are used interchangeably.

Now, scientists pretty much universally HATE that it's called "SARS-CoV-2." It's confusing, because it makes people think of SARS, which it is not, and it's a mouthful, and it's annoying to type. It wasn't really meant to be the final name for it, but no one could come up with a better name that was sticking, and there was a major push (and rightfully so) not to name this virus after places like viruses of the past because that causes social repercussions. But we needed to call it something, and this is what ended up being adopted as the official one. Maybe we'll rename it in a few years when we have more clarity.

Viral classification in general is a tricky subject and is constantly being revised. At the end of the day, it doesn't really matter, it's just useful to have a consensus on how to talk about things. But we can still study and understand how viruses work without knowing the best way to classify them.

These terms matter if you're reading a scientific article, but if you're reading a news piece or journalism, Coronavirus, COVID-19, and SARS-CoV-2 are effectively interchangeable. I will call it coronavirus or COVID-19 or even just "the virus" in casual conversation, and context makes it clear what I'm referring to.

 

[Willowy]

190 employees at Smithfield tested positive :/. I don't know how many were tested. It's considered the 4th highest "hot spot" in the entire US. I read there's a meat packing plant in Colorado that has a lot too, so meat processing must be a close-working kind of job. Or else maybe pigs can carry it? I wonder if anyone has done tests on that. The mayor had to say that people shouldn't be bigoted about it (because most people who work at meat packing plants aren't American-born), but I'm sure there will be plenty.

 

[molly92]

190 employees at Smithfield tested positive :/. I don't know how many were tested. It's considered the 4th highest "hot spot" in the entire US. I read there's a meat packing plant in Colorado that has a lot too, so meat processing must be a close-working kind of job. Or else maybe pigs can carry it? I wonder if anyone has done tests on that. The mayor had to say that people shouldn't be bigoted about it (because most people who work at meat packing plants aren't American-born), but I'm sure there will be plenty.

The group that showed the virus could infect cats also tried it in dogs, pigs, birds, and ferrets, and ferrets were the only other animal that it infected. Other coronaviruses are also not good at infecting pigs, so it's pretty unlikely that pork is a source.

Even though I'm interacting with fewer people than ever before, the amount of casual racism I still manage to come across is very sad.

 

[Willowy]

it's pretty unlikely that pork is a source.

I wouldn't think that eating pork would be a source, but at slaughter there's blood, guts, brains, saliva, feces, etc. Even if the pigs didn't contract the illness, perhaps there's some bodily-fluid kind of transmission. It just seems odd that so many would test positive when they wear masks and gloves and are under extremely strict sanitation rules anyway, unless there are communal cups in the breakroom or something.