MOD
Also, this isn't the only corona virus society has faced. There is MERS-CoV, SARS-CoV, and now SARS-CoV-2. These are all Corona Viruses.
COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2)
SARS-CoV-2 was first identified in the Chinese city of Wuhan in 2019. At the time of writing, numbers of infected
are still on the rise, with a mortality rate of around 1 percent.
Snakes
were originally suspected as a potential source for the outbreak, though other experts
have deemed this unlikely and proposed bats instead. As of February 2020, the search for the animal origin of COVID-19
is ongoing.
Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS-CoV)
SARS was first recognised as a distinct strain of coronavirus in 2003. The source of the virus has never been clear, though the first human infections can be traced back to the Chinese province of Guangdong in 2002.
The virus then became a pandemic, causing more than 8,000 infections of an influenza-like disease in 26 countries with
close to 800 deaths.
Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS-CoV)
MERS was first identified in Saudi Arabia in 2012 in people displaying symptoms of fever, cough, shortness of breath and occasionally gastrointestinal problems such as diarrhoea. An animal source for the virus has never been officially confirmed, though evidence points to dromedary camels as a potential reservoir of infection.
The
World Health Organisation has identified around 2,500 cases of infection in 27 countries since initial outbreaks, resulting in nearly 860 deaths.
What Is a Coronavirus?