Coronavirus outbreak
Everything you should know about the coronavirus outbreak Where has the new coronavirus come from? Coronavirus was first detected in December 2019 in Wuhan, a city in China’s Hubei province with a population of 11 million, after an outbreak of pneumonia without an obvious cause. The virus has now spread to over 200 countries and territories across the globe, and was characterized as a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO) on 11 March 2020. It is currently unclear where the virus has come from. Originally, the virus was understood to have originated in a food market in Wuhan and subsequently spread from animal to human. Some research has claimed that the cross-species transmission may be between snake and human; however, this claim has been contested. Mammals such as camels and bats have been implicated in previous coronavirus outbreaks, but it is not yet clear the exact animal origin. How contagious is COVID-19? Increasing numbers of confirmed diagnoses, including in healthca...