What Are Viruses? Novel Corona Virus And Protective Measures Against It
If you have been using a computer since long, you might know what viruses are. And for those who don’t, in computer science terminology, virus is something whose existence causes malfunctioning or anomalous behaviour in computers.
Now, transliterating it into human terminology, virus is an infectious agent of tiny size: invisible to naked eye and observable only via a microscope which once gets into your body, fights against your immune system and makes you weak to such an extent that you will die even if you catch a normal cold!
Just like a virus outside your computer cannot do something harmful, a real-world virus also functions similarly i.e., it needs to get inside your body to make you sick. Now getting into actual science, virus is defined as:
an ultramicroscopic, metabolically inert, infectious agent that replicates only within the cells of living hosts, mainly bacteria, plants, and animals: composed of an RNA or DNA core, a protein coat, and, in more complex types, a surrounding envelope.
How do they infect you?
A virus is only a shell surrounding genetic material and proteins and has no living thing. They can only make more of themselves by entering a live cell. Virus (in this case: Corona) can spread over surfaces, but how long it can live on them is still uncertain.
Its main way of spreading seems to be droplet infection when people cough, or if you touch someone ill and then your face. The virus starts its journey here and takes a ride deeper into the body. It has an adverse effect on its destinations, say, the intestines and the spleen. Even just a few viruses can cause a life-threatening situation.
Billions of epithelial cells line the lungs. These are the border cells of our body, lines the organs from getting infected. Virus connects to a specific receptor on its victim’s membranes to inject its genetic code. The cell unknowingly executes the new instructions i.e., make copies. It gets filled with more and more copies of the virus until it reaches a critical point: death of the cell.
The cell then sort of melts away, releasing fresh virus particles in the body ready to attack other cells. The number of virus-infected cells grows exponentially. In about a week millions of cells gets infected, and billions of viruses lines the lungs.
The immune system’s cells haven’t come into action yet, but when it does, causes more harm. Virus creates confusion for the immune system: whom to attack and whom to protect. The more and more immune cells arrive, the more damage they do by killing healthy tissues. This might get so serious that it can cause lifelong disabilities or even death.
Why Corona Virus is so dangerous?
being fast in life doesn’t always makes you a winner.
That’s the spirit behind SARS-2 aka CoViD-19.
Back in 1997, a Hong Kong kid developed which at first seemed like the common cold. They rushed him to the hospital when the symptoms—sore throat, fatigue, and cough continued for six days, where he died despite intensive care.
At the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, USA, they confirmed that it was a variant of influenza: the deadliest disease in history. After this development, the Chinese Government killed approx. 15 lakh chickens. By the end of the year, 6 people died out of 18 confirmed cases.
The only reason a few people got infected by this virus was that it was so severe: the ones who got this became extremely ill and died within a matter of days. Severe illness also facilitated in marking down and isolation of subjects, thus there was no community transmission.
Now, what makes SARS-2 deadliest is that it infects its subject slowly: it makes people sick, but not in a predictable way. Major symptoms similar to that of pneumonia are observed nearly after two weeks. And till that time the infected person spreads the virus wherever s/he goes, causing community transmission.
Containment is the first response to any outbreak, but we’re already past that and have failed in doing so. The first case of this virus was reported in December 2019. There wouldn’t have been these much deaths (as of now: 36,864) had it been encapsulated earlier. And because of as-you-know nature of China, it seems they deliberately failed in containing it.
Questions: Answered.
What are the symptoms of COVID-19?
The most common symptoms of COVID-19 are fever, tiredness and dry cough.
Some patients may have aches and pains, nasal congestion, runny nose, sore throat or diarrhoea. These symptoms are usually mild and begin gradually. Some people become infected but don’t develop any symptoms and don't feel unwell.
Most people (about 80%) recover from the disease without needing special treatment. Around 1 out of every 6 people who gets COVID-19 becomes seriously ill and develops difficulty breathing. Older people, and those with underlying medical problems like high blood pressure, heart problems or diabetes, are more likely to develop serious illness.
How to protect myself?
Since we don't have a vaccine for Corona, we have to socially engineer our behaviour, not getting infected and not infecting others.
It sounds trivial, but the best thing you can do is wash your hands. Soap is strong enough to kill the corona virus.
The next thing to do is social distancing, which is not a good experience, but a nice thing to do. This means: no hugging, no handshakes.
If you can stay at home, stay at home to protect those who need to be out there for society to function. Don’t run away from quarantines: Quarantines are not great to experience, and they are certainly not popular. But they give us - and the researchers who focus on medicine and vaccines in particular-critical time. And if you're quarantined, you're expected to understand why and accept it.
Should I wear a mask to protect myself?
Only wear a mask if you are ill with COVID-19 symptoms (especially coughing) or looking after someone who may have COVID-19. Disposable face mask can only be used once. If you are not ill or looking after someone who is ill, then you are wasting a mask. There is a world-wide shortage of masks, so WHO urges people to use masks wisely.
WHO advises rational use of medical masks to avoid unnecessary wastage of precious resources and misuse of masks.
The most effective ways to protect yourself and others against COVID-19 are to frequently clean your hands, cover your cough with the bend of elbow or tissue and maintain a distance of at least 1 meter (3 feet) from people who are coughing or sneezing.