Department of Chemistry, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2455, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia.
Department of Chemistry, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, P.O. Box 5048, Dhahran 31261, Saudi Arabia.
Molecules. 2020 Dec 23;26(1):39. doi: 10.3390/molecules26010039.
Humans have witnessed three deadly pandemics so far in the twenty-first century which are associated with novel coronaviruses: SARS, Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), and COVID-19. All of these viruses, which are responsible for causing acute respiratory tract infections (ARTIs), are highly contagious in nature and/or have caused high mortalities. The recently emerged COVID-19 disease is a highly transmittable viral infection caused by another zoonotic novel coronavirus named severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Similar to the other two coronaviruses such as SARS-CoV-1 and MERS-CoV, SARS-CoV-2 is also likely to have originated from bats, which have been serving as established reservoirs for various pathogenic coronaviruses. Although, it is still unknown how SARS-CoV-2 is transmitted from bats to humans, the rapid human-to-human transmission has been confirmed widely. The disease first appeared in Wuhan, China, in December 2019 and quickly spread across the globe, infected 48,539,872 people, and caused 1,232,791 deaths in 215 countries, and the infection is still spreading at the time of manuscript preparation. So far, there is no definite line of treatment which has been approved or vaccine which is available. However, different types of potential vaccines and therapeutics have been evaluated and/or are under clinical trials against COVID-19. In this review, we summarize different types of acute respiratory diseases and briefly discuss earlier outbreaks of coronaviruses and compare their occurrence and pathogenicity with the current COVID-19 pandemic. Various epidemiological aspects of COVID-19 such as mode of spread, death rate, doubling time, etc., have been discussed in detail. Apart from this, different technical issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic including use of masks and other socio-economic problems associated with the pandemic have also been summarized. Additionally, we have reviewed various aspects of patient management strategies including mechanism of action, available diagnostic tools, etc., and also discussed different strategies for the development of effective vaccines and therapeutic combinations to deal with this viral outbreak. Overall, by the inclusion of various references, this review covers, in detail, the most important aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
到目前为止，人类在 21 世纪已经见证了三次与新型冠状病毒相关的致命大流行：非典、中东呼吸综合征（MERS）和 COVID-19。所有这些病毒都导致急性呼吸道感染（ARTIs），在性质上具有高度传染性和/或导致高死亡率。最近出现的 COVID-19 疾病是一种由另一种人畜共患的新型冠状病毒引起的高度传染性病毒感染，这种新型冠状病毒被称为严重急性呼吸综合征冠状病毒 2（SARS-CoV-2）。与 SARS-CoV-1 和 MERS-CoV 等其他两种冠状病毒一样，SARS-CoV-2 也可能源自蝙蝠，蝙蝠一直是各种致病性冠状病毒的既定宿主。尽管目前尚不清楚 SARS-CoV-2 如何从蝙蝠传播到人类，但已经广泛证实了这种病毒可以在人与人之间快速传播。这种疾病于 2019 年 12 月首次在中国武汉出现，随后迅速在全球范围内传播，感染了 48539872 人，并在 215 个国家造成 1232791 人死亡，在撰写本文时，感染仍在继续传播。到目前为止，还没有被批准或可用的明确治疗方法。然而，已经评估了不同类型的潜在疫苗和疗法，并正在针对 COVID-19 进行临床试验。在这篇综述中，我们总结了不同类型的急性呼吸道疾病，并简要讨论了以前的冠状病毒爆发，并将其发生和致病性与当前的 COVID-19 大流行进行了比较。详细讨论了 COVID-19 的各种流行病学方面，如传播方式、死亡率、倍增时间等。除此之外，还总结了与 COVID-19 大流行相关的各种技术问题，包括口罩的使用和大流行带来的其他社会经济问题。此外，我们还审查了患者管理策略的各个方面，包括作用机制、可用诊断工具等，并讨论了开发有效疫苗和治疗组合以应对这种病毒爆发的不同策略。总的来说，通过纳入各种参考文献，本综述详细涵盖了 COVID-19 大流行的最重要方面。
