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This article documents the chronology and epidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 in 2019, the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and is responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. The first human cases of COVID-19 known to have been identified were in Wuhan, Hubei, China, in December 2019. It marked the beginning of the 2019–2020 COVID-19 outbreak in mainland China.
A September 2020 review noted the hypothetical possibility that the COVID-19 infection had already spread to Europe in 2019 by presumptive evidences including pneumonia case numbers and radiology in France and Italy in November and December. [1] However, a subsequent retrospective surveillance report determined there was no evidence of SARS-CoV-2 circulation in Rome (Italy) during this period. [2]
Some medical and environmental analyses in Italy, France, and the US found results which suggested the virus was circulating prior to December 2019 by several weeks. A WHO report states: "the study findings were not confirmed, methods used were not standardized, and serological assays may suffer from non-specific signals". It urges further investigation of these potential early events. [3]
According to an ABC news report, the American National Center for Medical Intelligence shared intelligence in late November, based on analysis of wire and computer intercepts and satellite images, regarding a potential respiratory disease in Wuhan. This was denied by the Pentagon. [4] On 13 March 2020, the South China Morning Post reported that Chinese government records suggest that the first case of infection with COVID-19 could be traced back to a 55-year-old Hubei resident on 17 November. [5]
On 23 May 2021, The Wall Street Journal reported that newly disclosed U.S. intelligence obtained that three researchers working at the BSL-4 laboratory of the Wuhan Institute of Virology were hospitalized with COVID-like symptoms. The report added weight to calls for a broader probe into the theory that the COVID-19 virus could have escaped from a laboratory. [6] [7] However, a WHO report states "introduction through a laboratory incident was considered to be an extremely unlikely pathway". [3] Since then, the head of the WHO COVID-19 origins investigative team, Peter Ben Embarek, has stated that the Chinese authorities exerted pressure on the WHO report conclusions, and that he in fact considers an infection via a researcher's field samples to be a "likely" scenario. [8]
Symptoms of the index case, or patient zero, began on 1 December. [9] The man had not been to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market. His family was unaffected, and no epidemiological link was found between him and the other laboratory-confirmed cases as of 2 January. [9]
This was the onset of the first 41 people who were tested and later confirmed positive for COVID-19, as reported by the Wuhan City Health Committee and the WHO in 2020. [10]
Symptoms of three more cases began on 10 December, which were later confirmed by laboratories. These patients are known because they became hospitalized on 16 December and thus sampled. Their results were confirmed two of these three had no direct exposure to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, while the other did. [9]
The fifth and sixth cases that were later confirmed by laboratories first felt symptoms on 15 December. Both patients had direct exposure to the Huanan Market. [9]
As of February 2020 [update] , the first documented COVID-19 hospital admissions worldwide were dated to 16 December 2019 in Wuhan. [9]
An unresolved clinical case sparks off the first scientific involvement: a bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BAL) sample was sent from Wuhan Central Hospital to Vision Medicals (广州微远基因科技) in Guangzhou, a private company specializing in metagenomic massive parallel sequencing analysis. [11] According to the GenBank record, the sample was obtained 23 December, whereas Ren et al.,Chin Med J, 2020 sets the date to 24 December 2019. [12] [13]
According to news reports in February 2020—Workers Daily, Global Times—at the Hubei Provincial Hospital of Integrated Chinese and Western Medicine and following the report from Doctor Zhang Jixian, the hospital immediately alerted the local CDC, Wuhan Jianghan Disease Prevention and Control Center, [14] however, the report of 22 January 2020 from the Chinese CDC seems to claim this contact falling on 29 December. [15]
On 28 December 2019, Dr. Lili Ren, a virologist at the Peking Union Medical College in Beijing submitted a complete sequence of SARS-CoV-2 structure to GenBank. The sequence was never made public as it failed to include the annotations required for publication, and attempts by the NIH to contact Dr. Ren went unanswered. [16]
On this day and the previous, three similar cases arrived at Hubei Provincial Hospital of Integrated Chinese and Western Medicine, all associated with the seafood market. The health authorities had been informed, and medical experts from Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital, "a hospital designated to treat infectious diseases" [17] came to transfer six of the seven patients. Zhang Jixian took the further initiative to let doctors and nurses in the respiratory department wear face masks, and put out an order for 30 hospital coats of fine canvas. [18] The administration at Hubei Provincial Hospital of Integrated Chinese and Western Medicine convened an interdepartmental panel of doctors, whose conclusions were the cases were unusual and required special attention, and also having learned of two similar cases in the city, decided to report their findings to the municipal and provincial health authorities, Wuhan Municipal Health Commission and Hubei Province Health Committee. [14]
The Wuhan CDC staff found also additional patients with similar symptoms who were linked to the market. [15] The Wuhan 'Center for Disease Control and Prevention' (CDC) is part of Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
Wuhan Central Hospital received a report from Beijing Boao Medical Laboratory stating that their sample (obtained 27 December) contained SARS coronavirus. [11] At the time, the laboratory only obtained a short partial sequence, which was rapidly shared with Vision Medicals, so that Vision Medicals could confirm that the sequence was SARS-CoV-2, i.e., roughly identical to the one they obtained 3 days before, and relatively distant to the original SARS coronavirus. [19]
Several doctors at Wuhan Central Hospital shared the test report on social media in discussions mainly aimed at colleagues. [11] As referred to by Caixin Online, from the social media account of Li Wenliang, it is stated that there are seven cases of SARS at Wuhan Central Hospital, all connected to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market. [11]
For Vision Medicals, too, these are hectic days (27–30 December) with the Chinese CDC requesting all results from Vision Medicals and from the Chinese Academy of Medical Science: "this was an urgent, secret and serious investigation". [19]
Wuhan Municipal Health Commission sent a hard-copy message to its affiliate institutions. [20] containing guidelines in confronting a possible outbreak of infectious pneumonia. [20] Two scanned copies also found their way, the same day, to the Weibo QQ service—a social media platform. [21] [22] [23]
FluTrackers, an international disease tracking website established in 2006, was the first report reaching an international context on the situation in Wuhan on 30 December at 23:35:00 as recorded in the Internet Archive and reported by The Washington Post , Forbes, and CIDRAP. [24] [25] [26] [27] The ProMED reporting program, under auspice of the International Society for Infectious Diseases (ISID), reported on the situation in Wuhan. The full date is actually 30 December 23:59:00. [20]
WHO may also have noticed the information coming out from Wuhan. [28]
The Wuhan Municipal Health Commission released a briefing on its website about early signs of a pneumonia outbreak in the city. [29] The message conveys the impression of alertness, by summarizing 30 December's orders to the city hospitals; emphasizing ongoing scientific and clinical investigations and to seek hospital care when having persistent fever while showing symptoms of pneumonia; as well advising the public to wear face masks and to avoid enclosed public places and crowded areas.
The message on pneumonia of unknown etiology was picked up by Chinese news agencies, including the state television CCTV, [30] local news agencies (such as Hubei Daily [31] ), and social media (such as the Weibo account of CCTV [32] People's Daily) said the exact cause remained unclear, and it would be premature to speculate. [33] Through the Weibo account "YangShiXinWen", CCTV also sent an alert about the unknown virus, adding that a team of experts from the National Health Commission would arrive in Wuhan. [30] [32] [ better source needed ]
Some international agencies also picked up on the reports, including Reuters, [34] Deutsche Welle, [35] and the South China Morning Post. [33]
Qu Shiqian, a vendor at the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, said government officials had disinfected the premises on 31 December and told stallholders to wear masks. Qu said he had learned of the pneumonia outbreak only from media reports. "Previously I thought they had flu", he said. "It should be not serious. We are fish traders. How can we get infected?" [33]
In response to the announcement from Wuhan, Hong Kong's Center for Health Protection tightened their inbound screening processes. They announced that various "surveillance measures at all boundary control points" have begun—including thermal imaging for checks on body temperature. [36] The center appealed to the public to maintain hygiene, with detailed advice on washing hands and wearing a mask, and further precautions when traveling outside Hong Kong. [36] Hong Kong's Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan announced "[any suspected cases] including the presentation of fever and acute respiratory illness or pneumonia, and travel history to Wuhan within 14 days before onset of symptoms, we will put the patients in isolation." [33]
Tao Lina, a public health expert and former official with the Shanghai Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said, "I think we are [now] quite capable of killing it in the beginning phase, given China's disease control system, emergency handling capacity and clinical medicine support." No human-to-human infection had been reported so far and more pathological tests and investigations were underway, an official said. [33]
The World Health Organization office in China picked up the media statement from the website of the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission on cases of viral pneumonia. [37] The WHO China office then notified the WHO Western Pacific Regional Office about the notice from the Wuhan government. [37]
The US CDC claimed to have "first learned of a 'cluster of 27 cases of pneumonia'" in Wuhan on this day. [38]
The Taiwan Centers for Disease Control (CDC) implemented inspection measures for inbound flights from Wuhan. [39] Deputy director Luo Yi-jun raised the alarm with his colleagues after reading about the outbreak on the PTT Bulletin Board System. [40] [41] Taiwan would end up having fewer than 500 total COVID-19 cases until September 2020.
Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) is a viral respiratory disease of zoonotic origin caused by the virus SARS-CoV-1, the first identified strain of the SARS-related coronavirus. The first known cases occurred in November 2002, and the syndrome caused the 2002–2004 SARS outbreak. In the 2010s, Chinese scientists traced the virus through the intermediary of Asian palm civets to cave-dwelling horseshoe bats in Xiyang Yi Ethnic Township, Yunnan.
The Wuhan Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, simply known as the Huanan Seafood Market, was a live animal and seafood market in Jianghan District, Wuhan, the capital of Hubei Province, in Central China. The market opened on 19 June 2002.
This article documents the chronology and epidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 in January 2020, the virus which causes the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and is responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. The first human cases of COVID-19 were identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019.
On 23 January 2020, the central government of China imposed a lockdown in Wuhan and other cities in Hubei in an effort to quarantine the center of an outbreak of COVID-19; this action was commonly referred to as the Wuhan lockdown. The World Health Organization (WHO), although stating that it was beyond its own guidelines, commended the move, calling it "unprecedented in public health history".
The COVID-19 pandemic in mainland China is part of the worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). China was where the first COVID outbreak occurred, the first where authorities imposed drastic measures in response, and was one of the first countries to bring the outbreak under control, at least temporarily.
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. Most scientists believe the SARS-CoV-2 virus entered into human populations through natural zoonosis, similar to the SARS-CoV-1 and MERS-CoV outbreaks, and consistent with other pandemics in human history. Social and environmental factors including climate change, natural ecosystem destruction and wildlife trade increased the likelihood of such zoonotic spillover. The disease quickly spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic.
Li Wenliang was a Chinese ophthalmologist who warned his colleagues about early COVID-19 infections in Wuhan. On 30 December 2019, Wuhan CDC issued emergency warnings to local hospitals about a number of mysterious "pneumonia" cases discovered in the city in the previous week. On the same day, Li, who worked at the Central Hospital of Wuhan, received an internal diagnostic report of a suspected severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) patient from other doctors which he in turn shared with his Wuhan University alumni through a WeChat group. He was dubbed a whistleblower when that shared report later circulated publicly, despite his messaging to his alumni WeChat group to not spread the message outside of the group with the exception to only "remind their family members and loved ones to be on the alert”, and Li did not appear to have intentions of warning the wider public. Rumors of a deadly SARS outbreak subsequently spread on Chinese social media platforms; Wuhan police summoned and admonished him and seven other doctors on 3 January for "making false comments on the Internet about unconfirmed SARS outbreak."
The COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, part of the global COVID-19 pandemic, was the first identified outbreak of the pandemic, appearing as a cluster of mysterious pneumonia cases in Wuhan, the provincial capital of Hubei, China. A Wuhan hospital notified the local Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and health commissions on December 27, 2019. On December 31, Wuhan CDC admitted that there was a cluster of unknown pneumonia cases related to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market after the unverified documents appeared on the Internet. The outbreak soon drew nationwide attention, with the National Health Commission (NHC) in Beijing sending medical experts to Wuhan the next day. On January 8, a new coronavirus was identified as the cause of the pneumonia. The sequence of the virus was soon published on an open-access database. Measures taken by China have been controversial. They were praised by the World Health Organization (WHO) for improvements over their response to SARS-CoV-2, but maligned by many in the international community for being deceptive or slow to publicly disclose key facts about the outbreak and for aggressively censoring information related to the outbreak and public discontent from citizens online.
Ai Fen is a Chinese doctor and director of the emergency department of Central Hospital of Wuhan. In December 2019, she was one of the first doctors to encounter pneumonia patients infected with the then-unknown virus, SARS-CoV-2. On 30 December 2019, Ai Fen received a diagnostic report of suspected "Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome cases". An image of the diagnostic report was shared on WeChat by an ophthalmologist at the hospital, Li Wenliang. The image was then circulated on the internet, leading Ai Fen to be questioned by hospital superiors. She was given the nickname "The Whistle-Giver" (发哨子的人) in an article in the Chinese Renwu magazine which was censored by the Chinese government but was reposted on the Chinese internet using emojis, Morse code and pinyin to circumvent censorship.
Xie Linka is a Chinese physician who gave early warning about the spread of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China. She became known for being a whistleblower, a title given to others in China who had warned the public, such as Liu Wen, and Dr. Li Wenliang, who was infected and later died from the virus.
The Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital is a public hospital located on Jinyintan Avenue in the Jiangjunlu Subdistrict, in the Dongxihu District of Wuhan, Hubei, China, and a unit directly under the Wuhan Municipal Health and Health Committee. Jinyintan Hospital specialises in infectious diseases. Jinyintan Hospital is one of the designated hospitals for emergency medical treatment in Hubei, including Wuhan. The hospital's president is Dr. Zhang Dingyu, a respiratory specialist. Its vice-director is Dr. Huang Chaolin.
Wang Guangfa is a Chinese physician. He is a respiratory expert at Peking University First Hospital.
Zhang Jixian is a Chinese pulmonologist. She is known to have discovered SARS‑CoV‑2, and was the director of the Department of Respiratory Medicine of Hubei Provincial Hospital of Integrated Chinese & Western Medicine. She is also a member of the Chinese Communist Party.
Su Ih-jen (Chinese: 蘇益仁; Wade–Giles: Su1 Yi4-jen2; born 1950) is a Taiwanese medical researcher and distinguished investigator who was the director of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the National Health Research Institutes in Taiwan.
This article documents the situation of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Tibet Autonomous Region.
The COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing is part of the worldwide pandemic of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The disease first reached Beijing on 20 January 2020.
This article documents the chronology of the response to the COVID-19 pandemic in January 2020, which originated in Wuhan, China in December 2019. Some developments may become known or fully understood only in retrospect. Reporting on this outbreak began in December 2019.
During the COVID-19 pandemic in mainland China, the government of China under CCP general secretary Xi Jinping's administration pursued a zero-COVID strategy to prevent the domestic spread of COVID-19 until late 2022. Aspects of the response have been controversial, with the zero-COVID approach being praised and the government's lack of transparency, censorship, and spread of misinformation being criticized. The government abandoned its zero-COVID policy on 7 December 2022.
The 2019–2020 COVID-19 outbreak in mainland China was the first COVID-19 outbreak in that country, and the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). China was the first country to experience an outbreak of the disease, the first to impose drastic measures in response, and one of the first countries to bring the outbreak under control.
The COVID-19 pandemic in China is part of the worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). China was the first country to experience an outbreak of the disease, the first to impose drastic measures in response, and one of the first countries to bring the outbreak under control.
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: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)WHO's Country Office in the People's Republic of China picked up a media statement by the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission from their website on cases of 'viral pneumonia' in Wuhan, People's Republic of China.