[LightDestory]

Up today the death toll raised to 250 people with 7000-8000 people infected, it is very scary because we are reading news from every part of the world about infection cases. This virus is slowly spreading itself around the globe.

A lot of industries are closing their business in China: Apple, Foxcomm, McDonald, Google, Samsung, all of them in order to prevent further spreading on their employees. But this action is useless due to Huan's size and the number of people there is so huge that every infected person can infect around 100-500 people before begin tracked and put on hospital.

Right now China is facing a very devastating virus but we can presume that when they put under control the situation, a new problem will come out: economical crisis and a take down of their market because no one will interact with China before the virus is completely cured.

On the rest of the globe, everyone fear this news virus and it is starting to complain about the presence of chinese people around them due to a possible infection. A lot of people complain about the chinese culture of food and live style. This virus wasn't on human scope but chinese people bring it there.

I don't have an opinion regarding chinese culture but well I am currently hoping that this virus doesn't reach Italy, me or my family.

[xdude]

I think one reason lack of cases found in India is for some reason not many Chinese go there as a travel or work destination. So far all death are Chinese nationals and I think almost all infected also Chinese in China or those who travel to other countries. I don't know the latest news but it's strange how it hasn't got to other people yet. Or maybe it's already have.

[deanhills]

One thing I learned today is that so far there has only been a 2% death rate of all those who got the Corona Virus.  Those who passed on were either older people with weak immune systems or individuals with lung or respiration issues.  The death rate for the normal flu is much higher.  So I wonder who stands to make so much money out of marketing this Virus to the extent it's been marketed. The stock markets? Wonder how many stock brokers put in orders favouring the fall in prices?

But yes, @xdude has a good point.  Like the same thing was said of the ebola virus that it seems to be contained to middle of Africa.  But again, there is no comparison between Ebola and Corona if one takes the very low record of Corona virus deaths compared with Ebola.

If the reports of today are correct.

Another thing we've learned with SARS - the previous similar virus - is that the virus can change itself. It could change into something completely different tomorrow to adapt to its new environment for example.  As much as the virus originated from an animal source (if that is indeed the correct source) it can also then transfer to different settings and human beings.

[rudra]

I just want to share some of my thoughts here. I am no expert in any of the topics here. So these are just some opinions or ideas that came to me while I was reading the posts above..

1) Why it has not happened elsewhere ? It is not just in China where there are places with high population density or they ear animals. [it is not like everywhere you go in china, they have people all around. lol. ]

My thoughts:  It is like asking why there are chimps and gorillas and monkeys ? why so many varieties with vastly different tendencies ? Why havn't they all evolved closer to us in intelligence and abilities ? We did..or our ancestors did...

 We are still trying to find good answers to Whats and Hows. What could have happened if we changed something is really far in the future.

This virus has high infection rate and it infects even when dormant and how it infects is not still clear ( as of right now). You read it right. They can lie dormant in you for two weeks even without any symptoms and transmit to others from you during that phase [ novel ]. What is even more worrisome is that those tiny things do multiply really rapidly. Which means they can go through multiple generations really fast.  

Experts are afraid that during its activities in our bodies it gets in contact with other genetic materials from other sources and might acquire new power while keeping this novel ones or may contribute its novel powers to others and transform them into devastating ones.

the dangerous ones are those with high adaptability and high transmission rate. Not the ones that have big host kill rate. They will just deplete their living space. We are afraid of genetic material reservoirs.

2) only chinese are getting affected. it might be a sabotage or bio weapons development effort gone wrong.

totally wrong. most probably wrong.

I didn't read any reliable source yet. but the jumping from wild animal theory is most probable. it happened with AIDS, SARS and other cases. That is how it happens. Hindus are living besides cows and goats and chickens for thousands of years. They are not getting affected by any such illness. They use fresh cow poo with water to polish their earthen floors and hold it pure and cleansing. JUST THINK ABOUT IT. They are actually increasing the rate of contact with all those bacterias that are there in those animals. That is how they remain unaffected by them. The people who are born in sanitary places like cities and then come to villages are often get affected very fast.

Also the word is "yet". One of those thousands of bacterias could develop/accumulate a bunch of dangerous changes in their genes in become deadly. Also Think about E. Coli in domestic animal poo.

Living close by, they share the same bacterial and viral  environment. So Neither of them are able to surprise the other by bringing any novel strain or genetic material or anything in the mix.

But here we are talking about wild animals. It is like Europeans bringing illnesses to America. They were all humans.

SO IN SHORT.. The fear is not that it is killing everyone it infects. The fear is it will transform into something or help transform one into something that is as deadly and can live on multiple hosts and simply containing the currently infected people wont be enough then.

All the old bacteria and virus that we dont get that much infected by any more, will eventually acquire new powers and come back. it has periods.

[Littlemaster]

Some people say this is some kind of bio weapon created by some evil people. I don't know the truth behind it. But I can say the food habit has something to do with the illness. I don't know why some people eat rats for hunger. They should be provided food.

[fChk]

I read the previous posts (or tried to..); each one focuses on some aspect of the Coronavirus drama .. So, I'll stick to the title's explicit questions, thus adding my own perspective.

Coronaviruses (CoVs) ?
They are ancient, ubiquitous and classified under 4 major categories: alpha, beta, delta and gamma. Only alpha and beta coronaviruses are known to be human pathogens as they are the second leading cause of the common cold -accounting for about 20% of the cases- ( the rhinoviruses are the first with 50% of the cases) and until fairly recently, rarely caused any disease more serious than a common cold in humans.

There are (as of this date) 3 highly pathogenic Human CoronaViruses (HCoVs) are:

• SARS-CoV (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome CoronaVirus) -a beta-HCoV that was responsible of the 2002 atypical pneumonia first described in Guangdong Province (China.) Genomic sequencing of the SARS-CoV helped in shaping a consensus postulating that bats were the natural hosts.
  SARS-CoV infected 8098 individuals; 774 died.
  
• MERS-CoV (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome CoronaVirus) -a 2012 HCoV that has caused a total of 2494 cases and 858 deaths, the majority in Saudi Arabia.
  
• 2019-nCoV (2019 novel CoronaVirus) - linked to the outbreak to a Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China; the first case of pneumonia from 2019-nCoV was reported on Dec. 8th. The most important event uptil now is that chinese Scientists have sequenced the virus’s genome and made it available on Jan. 10 (here.)
  

The Commonalities:

• They all seem to emerge from animal reservoirs; so first there is an animal to human infection case, which then evolves into a global epidemics following flue-type human-2-human infections BUT an with alarming morbidity and mortality.
  
• The RNA genomes of these highly pathogenic HCoVs are very similar. It has been reported that the 2019-nCoV is 86.9% identical to the bat SARS-like coronavirus [See https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NE...tured_home]
  
• It's likely that they all enter human cells using the same receptor(/doorway) that SARS did. The receptor is called ACE2 (for Angiotensin Converting Enzyme 2), which is a glycoprotein exposed on the cell surface to which a “spike protein” on the virus’s surface first attaches and then enables the virus to fuse with the host cell and let it injects its "payload" (its genome that will hijack the host cell machimary). It's the classic key-lock analogy taught in Molecular Biology courses. Which means in layman's term that both HCoVs have the same KEY that they use to unlock the door/lock that exist in the cells of the bottom repiratory tract of Human-beings thus causing Pneumonia when they start their lytic cycle (multiplication.)
  

For the rest, much of it is just speculation and fearmongering, which is good for the 24/7 News cycle.

In essence, much of this is fueled by Globalization; China being the Epicentre of the World trade. Just contrast the impact of MERS-CoV (Saudi Arabia) versus SARS-CoV and 2019-nCoV (both from China.)

Welcome to the 21st century!

[huuthi95]

According to CNN, scientists believe that SARS came from bats then spread to civets - an animal considered a delicacy in southern China, followed by humans. According to experts, 2019-nCoV (corona virus in Wuhan) can also originate from Huanan seafood market and can be transmitted to humans from snakes, or from bats.

[arsalahmed786]

As far as i know about it, It ain't new virus, It first discovered back in 1960s and as all virus evolve it also evolved by the time. And the recently scientist gave it name (2019-nCoV). I heard it got "CoronaVirus" name because it have small crowns on it. And every virus last no longer than 14 days, So the Wuhan city locked-down for 14 days. The main reason we all worried about this virus is we don't have it's cure yet. No vaccination have been made yet.

[tryp4vps]

As far as i know about it, It ain't new virus, It first discovered back in 1960s and as all virus evolve it also evolved by the time. And the recently scientist gave it name (2019-nCoV). I heard it got "CoronaVirus" name because it have small crowns on it.....

Although it is true that the general term "corona virus" is not new, the corona virus originated from Wuhan in 2019 is indeed new. Because it does have new DNA sequencing.

That is also why WHO needs to give a new name, COVID-19, for the disease. Source.

[sagher]

As i read an article which Russian Media released that America was develop this corona virus to destroy China economy?
bbc news also publish this news. anyone have positive clues and history about that?