COVID-19 Disease, Suggested Measures, Government Initiatives and Outbreaks

Covid-19 Research Paper
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Covid-19 Research Paper
Coronavirus disease (Covid-19) currently dominates today’s society, and its history is being rewritten constantly. The disease poses a significant health burden for health systems and the sustainability of global populations given the high mortality rates that continue to be recorded. This report examines the Covid-19 pathogen, the antimicrobials for the disease, virus transmission routes, recommended measures to mitigate the health risk from the virus, government departments’ efforts to reduce the impact of the illness, and historical background of the disease as well as containment measures.
Description of the Pathogen
A sequence of acute unusual respiratory illnesses ravaged the City of Wuhan in China’s Hubei province starting from December 2019. The novel coronavirus that was causing these unusual infections in the Coronaviridae class and was later referred to as the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). The respiratory illness caused by the novel coronavirus is referred to as the Coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) by the World Health Organization (WHO) (Parasher, 2021). This virus belongs to the same coronavirus group as the severe respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) and the zoonotic Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) that caused more detrimental epidemics within recent years. Research indicates that the SARS-CoV-2 is a positive-stranded RNA virus in the genus Betacoronavirus characterized by a crown because of its spike glycoproteins, as seen in the figure below (Ouassou et al., 2020).
Figure 1: A graphical depiction of SARS-CoV-2 ultrastructural morphology (Ouassou et al., 2020).
The above illustration shows the ultrastructural morphology shown by a coronavirus. More importantly, note the spikes adorning the external surface of the pathogen, which impart the look of a corona engulfing the virion, as seen via the electron microscope.
Antimicrobials for Covid-19 Disease
Antimicrobials (more specifically antibiotics) are common medicines used to manage and treat bacterial infections. Antibiotics have been shown to slow down the reproduction of certain viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, the virus causing Covid-19. Within laboratory tests, azithromycin is an antibiotic known to reduce inflammation and viral activity and thus has the potential to treat Covid-19 disease (Popp et al., 2021). Research in the use of antibiotics to manage Covid-19 indicated that azithromycin, cefuroxime, meropenem, vancomycin, cefepime, ceftazidime, ciprofloxacin, tazobactam/piperacillin, benzylpenicillin, erythromycin, gentamicin, ampicillin, amoxicillin-clavulanic, amoxicillin, ceftriaxone, clarithromycin, and doxycycline as highly recommended in the management of Covid-19 infection (i.e., severe, moderate, mild, and asymptomatic illness) (Adebisi et al., 2021). Adebisi and colleagues further noted that the WHO indicates that prophylaxis or antibiotic therapy should not be utilized in patients with moderate or mild Covid-19 unless it is justified.
Antibiotics do not work against the virus, including the SARS-CoV-2. The antibiotics, as mentioned earlier, have proved effective for the management of Covid-19 and not in treating the illness. Some Covid-19 patients could develop bacterial infections as a complication (World Health Organization, 2021). In this case, health care providers recommend antibiotics in treating such bacterial infections. Currently, there is no licensed antibiotic to treat Covid-19. According to Adebisi et al. (2021), the Covid-19 pandemic shows that we are at risk of more severe infections for which there is no specific practical treatment option.
Routes of Infection
The illness caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus spread between individuals in various distinct routes. The most common transmission mode for the virus is by an infected person’s nose or mouth during face-to-face exposure via small liquid particles when they sneeze, speak, cough, breathe, or sing. These particles include both smaller aerosols and larger respiratory droplets (World Health Organization, 2020). There is a higher transmission risk when a person is exposed to an infected individual (within six feet for a minimum of fifteen minutes) and a less likely transmission when briefly exposed to asymptomatic contacts. Contact surface spread is another route involving a person touching an infected surface and then touching their mouth, nose, or eyes without sanitizing their hands is another transmission route. Transmission can also happen through aerosols (smaller liquid particles suspended in the air), but it remains unclear whether this constitutes a substantial infection source in persons outside laboratory settings. The presence of aerosols in a physiological form (for example, coughing) does not imply that small particles suspended in the air are infectious. Maternal Covid-19 is linked to a lower risk of vertical transmission (Wiersinga et al., 2020). Additional research is ongoing to enhance understanding of the transmission routes of SARS-CoV-2 and the settings that exacerbate the risk of contracting the disease (World Health Organization, 2020).
Measures to Reduce the Health Risks from SARS-CoV-2
Recommended measures for mitigating the risk of contracting the Covid-19 pathogen are categorized into generally suggested interventions that apply to diverse settings, including social settings and those working within care and health settings. Regarding the former recommendations, people must adhere to their respective governments’ regulations and measures to cont...