The Chinese state media outlet Xinhua urged calm after the spike was reported. On 14 February, Chinese authorities revealed for the first time the number of infections in medical staff. They said 1, health workers had contracted the virus, 6 of whom had died. Some researchers in China are unhappy with the designated name for the new coronavirus, SARS-CoVĬlassification rules and established naming practice also informed the decision. Although the two viruses belong to the same species, SARS-CoV-2 spreads much faster than SARS-CoV but is less deadly, says Shibo Jiang, a virologist at Fudan University in Shanghai. SARS-CoV retreated in the summer, but nobody knows what the new virus will do in the coming months, he says. People might think it will behave similarly and stop taking precautions come summer. Scientists also worry about the potential social and economic impact for China of revisiting the bad memories associated with SARS. On 9 February, virologists in China suggested in a paper in Virologica Sinica that the latest virus be called transmissible acute respiratory syndrome, or TARS-CoV. Not everyone is bothered by the designated name. People just want the virus to go away as quickly as possible, he says. Listen: Nature reporters Nisha Gaind and Nick Howe discuss the latest news from the coronavirus outbreak. Cases of the new coronavirus, which is now known as SARS-CoV-2, might be going undetected in some nations considered at high risk of an outbreak because they are reporting fewer cases than expected or none at all, say scientists. Infections have been detected in 24 countries outside China so far. But several of those countries, including Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and Malaysia, have reported fewer cases than the model predicts. Indonesia, another country at risk, has yet to report a single case. The possibility of unreported cases is particularly concerning in countries with weaker health-care systems, such as those in southeast Asia and Africa, which could quickly be overwhelmed by a local outbreak. No cases have been reported in Africa so far, but some countries there, such as Nigeria, are at particular risk because of strong business ties to China. World Health Organization officials outlined their top research priorities for controlling the outbreak of the coronavirus-associated disease now known as COVID At the close of a two-day international forum in Geneva, Switzerland, assessing the outbreak, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus spoke about the importance of developing candidate therapeutics and easy-to-apply diagnostics for identifying active, asymptomatic and resolved infections. Research should also look to understand the best approach for infection prevention, including assessing whether lockdowns in major Chinese cities have had a positive or negative effect on slowing the spread of virus.
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