Introduction
Since December 2019, a new type of coronavirus called novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV, or COVID-19) was identified in Wuhan, China. The COVID-19 has then rapidly spread to all over China and the world. It can cause symptoms including fever, difficulty in breathing, cough, and invasive lesions on both lungs of the patients [1]. It can spread to the lower respiratory tract and cause viral pneumonia. In severe cases, patients suffer from dyspnea and respiratory distress syndrome.
The pandemic has a big number of infected patients that far exceeded the equivalents of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndromes (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), though with a lower fatality rate. According to the surveillance statistics reported by the Chinese government, by February 19, 2020, the number of confirmed infection cases increased to 44,412 for Wuhan and 74,280 for whole China, with 1497 and 2009 deaths respectively. Moreover, the pandemic has caused 919 confirmed infection cases and 3 deaths globally. Therefore, Wuhan city and Hubei Province are the targets for intensive interventions. Otherwise, the spread would have been much faster to all China and the world.
Wuhan is a transportation hub of China, it is a highly dense city and has a large population of more than 14 million in 2019. The World Health Organization (WHO) had a meeting on January 30, 2020 and they declared the coronavirus outbreak from China a public health emergency of international concern. Further, there are lots of concerns and debates all over the world, indicating a need for more understanding of China’s systems in responding to the outbreak. Therefore, based on our firsthand experience of working with few of the COVID-19 cases, the purpose of this article is to have a brief report of current development, challenges, and future directions of the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan.