Mark Lennihan / AP
A woman, who declined to give her name, wears a mask, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2020 in New York. She works for a pharmaceutical company and said she wears the mask out of concern for the coronavirus.
Friday, Feb. 28, 2020 | 12:21 p.m.
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Nevada hasn’t had any reported cases of the coronavirus, the respiratory illness that originated in China. But the virus has spread to some 60 countries, and things could get worse, including in Nevada and the rest of the United States.
The head of the World Health Organization said today that the risk of the virus spreading worldwide was “very high,” citing the “continued increase in the number of cases and the number of affected countries.”
And it is getting closer to home.
Officials in neighboring California on Thursday announced the state had 33 confirmed cases and 8,400 people being monitored for symptoms.
Earlier in the week, the World Health Organization and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services declared a public health emergency. The Trump administration on Monday sent Congress a $2.5 billion supplemental budget request to fight the virus.
The immediate risk to Americans is still considered low, as there have been 63 confirmed cases in the U.S. But that could quickly change and being prepared is critical, officials have stressed.
“Given the number of cases we’re seeing overseas, I think it’s very likely we’ll see a coronavirus case here,” said Vit Kraushaar, a medical investigator with the Southern Nevada Health District. “I’m less worried about having a traveler come here than I am about seeing community spread. It’s likely we’ll see that at some point. I think there’s a lot of fear now because this is a new virus and it feels like we’ve never dealt with anything like it before, but we deal with fairly similar situations every year with influenza.”
What is COVID-19?
A new strain of coronavirus, COVID-19, was detected in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China, and has since spread to six continents and some 60 countries. There have been 2,462 deaths worldwide from coronavirus, a respiratory virus.
“The recommendations from the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) are to prepare for the worst, but hope the worst never happens,” Kraushaar said. “We see what’s happening in the rest of the world, so now’s the time to prepare. It looks like anywhere from 1% to 3% of the people who get this disease die. To some people, that’s a large number. To others, it’s a small number. In reality, there are probably more infected people than what we realize because not every infected person is showing symptoms.”
The countries with the most reported cases are China, South Korea, Italy and Iran. The list of countries hit by the illness edged toward 60 as Mexico, Belarus, Lithuania, New Zealand, Nigeria, Azerbaijan, Iceland and the Netherlands reported their first cases.
Close to home
The first U.S. case of coronavirus from an unknown source was confirmed this week in Vacaville, Calif. In Northern Nevada, health officials are working to assure residents that plans are in place to address the possible spread of the illness across the state line to Nevada.
The Washoe County Health District announced it was working with regional hospitals, the Washoe County School District, UNR, airport authorities and others on protocols to prevent an outbreak of the disease and isolate any cases that might occur in the area. Officials said the plan was similar to those in place to address bird flu and Ebola virus.
“We look to the CDC and the federal government for guidance, but ultimately it does come down to what we’re able to do locally,” health district epidemiologist Randall Todd told KTVN news in Reno.
The health district also posted a page on its website with information about the disease, including risk factors and advice for medical professionals and travelers. The page can be found at www.washoecounty.us Northern Nevada has received one CDC test kit for coronavirus, which provides enough materials to test a few hundred people. The kit is housed at the Nevada State Public Health Laboratory at UNR.
Symptoms
The CDC says symptoms include fever, shortness of breathe and coughing. In extreme cases, organ failure can occur. Symptoms may appear in as few as two days or as long as 14 days after exposure.
Those with symptoms should share their travel history with their doctor, especially if they have recently visited an area where the virus is more prevalent.
Possible vaccine
Scientists at Moderna Therapeutics in Cambridge, Mass., are developing a possible vaccine that would be ready for human testing in April, Time magazine reports. The first vials were forwarded this week to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
In the interim, Moderna Therapeutics also began testing remdesivir, an antiviral drug developed to fight Ebola, on patients infected with coronavirus. The results were encouraging when remdesivir was tested on animals infected with the disease, Time reports.
The first patient to test remdesivir is an American who tested positive for the disease while on the Diamond Princess cruise ship.
For now, recovery from the coronavirus depends on the strength of a person’s immune system. Many who have died from coronavirus were already in poor health.
How does it spread?
Touching an infected surface and then touching your nose, eyes or mouth is one way the virus spreads. It can also spread when an infected person coughs or sneezes on someone.
It is also possible to spread the virus before an infected person shows symptoms.
How to protect yourself
• If you have recently returned from an affected area, stay home and avoid others for 14 days. That’s especially true with students, whose concern should be preventing the disease from spreading and not worrying about missing classes.
• Thoroughly wash your hands, including in between your fingers and under your fingernails.
• Cover your mouth and nose with tissue when you sneeze, then throw the tissue away.
China laundering money — literally
China is sterilizing cash in an attempt to stop the virus from spreading. Last week, banks withdrew potentially infected cash from circulation and released bills that were sterilized. Decontaminated bills are stored for seven to 14 days before returning to the market.
Money taken from high-risk places such as hospitals and markets won’t be put back into circulation.
What about my travels?
The CDC is urging seniors citizens and those with chronic medical conditions to cancel trips to high-risk countries. The U.S. State Department is asking Americans to not visit China, issuing a Level 4 travel warning. Lower-level travel warnings have been issued for South Korea, Iran, Italy and Japan.
Foreign nationals who have traveled in China in the last two weeks are not allowed to enter the United States.
What about visitors traveling through the Las Vegas airport?
McCarran International Airport is not among the U.S. airports where screening for the coronavirus is taking place. If screening were to begin at McCarran, it would be at the discretion of the CDC, airport officials said.
Travelers coming to Las Vegas from China must first go through an “entry screening” at an airport in San Francisco, New York (JFK International), Los Angeles (LAX), Atlanta or Chicago (O’Hare International), the CDC said.
CNN reports more than 30,000 passengers were screened in the past month using a temperature check. Not a single coronavirus case was caught, although some health experts argue temperature checks fail to catch coronavirus half the time, according to CNN. Those with a normal temperature could already be infected but not have a fever.
Financial markets tanking
Economists have forecast global growth will slip to 2.4% this year, the slowest since the Great Recession in 2009, and down from earlier expectations closer to 3%. For the United States, growth estimates are as low as 1.7% for this year, down from 2.3% in 2019.
But if COVID-19 becomes a global pandemic, economists expect the impact could be much worse, with the U.S. and other global economies falling into recession.
U.S. markets are heading for their worst week since the financial crisis, with the final tally of economic damage from the spreading virus still unknown.
On Friday, companies continued to issue warnings about weaker sales as the outbreak shut down industrial centers, emptied shops and restricted global travel.
Perhaps no other business has been damaged more than cruise operators, with a nightmare narrative emerging from the Diamond Princess, a ship that docked in Japan with 3,700 people aboard.
Those on the ship were quarantined after a passenger who had disembarked tested positive for the virus. Infections spread across the ship, eventually afflicting 700 passengers and crew.
Shares of cruise operators plunged 30% or more as shipboard infections rose.
Who is being quarantined?
Citizens returning from China are first screened before re-entering the United States. If there are no symptoms, people are asked to monitor their health and stay home for two weeks before returning to work and other responsibilities.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
