Untraceable coronavirus outbreaks have emerged in three countries, and several health officials say unidentifiable supply chains they are the first sign that the virus is spreading at an uncontrollable rate.
Doctors have not yet been able to positively identify the source of the coronavirus outbreaks in South Korea, Italy and Iran. The World Health Organization also yesterday urged a more rigorous approach to contain the virus.
“A number of localized outbreaks in many parts of the world is a sign that things are moving forward and that we will almost certainly find ourselves in a pandemic”he said Ian mackay, researcher at the Australian University of Queensland. Doctors began to seriously worry about this scenario yesterday, after 2 more victims in Iran, the enormous growth of cases in South Korea and the first victim in Italy.
When can a virus like the coronavirus be called a pandemic?
Technically, a pandemic occurs when a disease spreads robustly to at least two continents. The presence and spread of the different coronavirus outbreaks with an unidentifiable source begins to foreshadow a possible scenario of this kind.
So far only hypotheses for the source of the coronavirus outbreaks in Iran, South Korea and Italy
In Iran an untraceable case that has spread to 28 other people is believed to have cropped up in the city of Qom, but no trace of patient zero.
Hundreds of new cases detected in South Korea were allegedly triggered by a member of a church in the city of Daegu, but doctors were unable to pinpoint its source.
Even in Italy the patient suspected of having spread the virus to the first two infected people in Codogno tested negative, without even a trace of antibodies, and there is still no trace of the origin of the other outbreaks in Veneto.
Doctors fear that the spread could accelerate and widen if they are no longer able to pinpoint the sources of coronavirus outbreaks, or to identify all infected and quarantine them. To make matters worse, coronavirus symptoms are often so mild that a spreader may not be aware that they are infected.
People are unlikely to die from mild cases, but keeping them running around “is really bad news if you're trying to stop a pandemic,” he said Mackay about subtle symptoms.
An official from the World Health Organization warned that “the window of opportunity is narrowing” to contain the virus.
