Khalid Simply Says

  5 Things We Should Know About Infection Control, Viruses and Respiratory Droplets. Courtesy of: CDC Project First Line   The CDC created the Inside Infection Control vlog series to share some basic ideas behind infection control, how they apply to COVID-19 and how these ideas can help yourself and others.   The difference between SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19. SARS-CoV-2 is the scientific name of the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). COVID-19 Symptoms   A person with the disease COVID-19 may experience these symptoms: fever, chills, cough, difficulty breathing, etc. When discussing the pandemic, we often talk about the number of people with COVID-19. All viruses have a couple of parts, including genes and proteins. These parts help the virus get around inside the infected person's body and transmit to others. The genes contain the information a virus needs to multiply. Most of the proteins in a virus come together to create a shell or...

Survival of Corona Virus in the Air and on the Surfaces Research done at the National Institute of Health, USA Published   in the New England Journal Of Medicine 17 March 2020 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2004973?query=RP The scientists at the NIH have researched the behavior of the Covid-19 related corona virus in the laboratory and compared it to the SARS related virus (another corona virus). The authors caution that the results should be interpreted with caution because of variables and the fact that the data is based on simulated laboratory environments. For the full article, please use the link to the medical journal provided above. What I learn from this laboratory study is that SARS and the Covid-19 related viruses were compared in the lab as to how long they hung on in the air or on various surfaces, they behaved similarly. The authors state that perhaps the difference between SARS and Covid-19 depends on the amount of virus particles coughed...

How to Navigate the Corona Virus Sharing useful information from the Wall Street Journal Edited and summarized by Khalid Rehman. MD How to Navigate Corona Virus was published in the Wall Street Journal on Friday March 13, 2020. I found the information accurate, clear and timely and have summarized it here. What is Corona Virus and where did it come from?: The scientific name of this new (novel) virus is SARS-CoV-2 and the illness it causes is called COVID-19. It belongs to the Corona Virus family. SARS and MERS viruses are the other notable members of this family. It generally infects bats and small mammals. It is believed to have been transmitted to humans from a small mammal in the city of Wuhan in China. It is highly infectious and is transmitted through particles spread during coughing and sneezing. How do you know if you have it? The virus can cause mild flu like symptoms as well as lower respiratory infection like pneumonia. The early symptoms are sore thr...

Do I have common cold or Corona Virus? All of us have had viral infections sometimes in our lives. Common cold, the stomach virus and Influenza virus are some of the more common ones. The current worldwide epidemic named COVID-19 is a respiratory tract illness that is caused by a virus that belongs to the corona virus family. The official name of the virus is SARS-CoV-2. The other well-known viruses in the corona virus family are SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome) viruses. The common way to diagnose infections is to culture the germs, e.g. for suspected strep throat, the doctor takes a swab from the throat and sends it to the lab for culture. The lab grows the bugs in the petri dish and report back to the doctor’s office in day or two. Unfortunately, viruses cannot be grown in the petri dish. So how do we diagnose viral infections?   There are essentially two methods: One is to determine if the patient has the in...