CoronaVirus - What's The Truth? - Behind The Headlines - Part 1

hello now I've got something new.this I'd like to try today um there's an awful lot of information fear in the news about the novel coronavirus that's causing problems in China at the moment and met appears to be spreading as well and I think there's an awful lot of misinformation out there and I've had this idea that sort of been percolating for a little bit about perhaps doing a video series entitled what's going to kill me this week the idea being that you know we take something that's in the news or something that's very topical at the moment and we try to unpick it and see you know what's the science behind it and how concerning it is to you know yourselves at home and I think that the corona virus is a really good place to start at the minute because I've had patients and one of the practices that I were already beginning to talk about some of their worries about this new virus so with that in mind what I'm hoping is on this episode we're going to have a go at looking at what we know so far about the virus what actually is this corona virus and crucially how is it different from our common or garden but still deadly flu what can we do about the corona virus ourselves and you know what you know information do you actually need to be furnished with to try and reduce some of the worry that people might be having at home sound like a plan okay so let's give that a go and I'm going to have a guest with me today when I graduated from Warwick University I went initially for my foundation program as a junior doctor to work at the super hospital here in Coventry University Hospital Coventry and Warwickshire and it's a super Hospital because it's a tertiary Center that means it's got some truly excellent toys in there you know proper big-league medical stuff and that also means you get some big-league doctors there not me I hasten to add I was very much the smallest minnow in the biggest pond there but when I was there I had to work on their respiratory wards and some of the teams that work there tend to be populated by the most skilled doctors but one of the consultants there dr. Ravi Gander how can i how can I give you a picture of what he's like he's basically House a but nice and he did the infectious diseases there so Tropical Medicine dealing with TB dealing with the really you know unique and potentially nasty stuff Eve now runs a travel clinic here in Coventry providing vaccines for people who are going off to travel to areas where there could be medically at risk but also dealing with people who have been exposed to some nasty and also helping get them the treatment that they need dr. gout has very kindly agreed that we could pop over to a travel clinic and hopefully we'll be able to you know give you guys some information and just reduce some of the worry that's there you know we kind of want to be able for people to read something on you know social media or on the newspaper and say actually I know I have the facts I know that that's just scary I know I don't need to be worried about that what I need to do to protect myself in any case is XYZ and obviously I don't need to explain that that's going to be washing your hands the first off but we'll see if there's any more that you can do and that on its own okay let's head over to traffic like [Music] hi James how are you any well yes yeah good good that good see come on through come on thanks doctor gala thank you very much for having us here so I just and you know taking time out of your busy clinic I do really appreciate it's not a prom at all so um we've all seen the news at the minute within the novel coronavirus is in China and I you know would be there's a lot of information in you know online and I'd get the feeling that some things are getting a bit distorted out there so I've had lots of questions that have come through from YouTube about the corona virus and with yourself being an infectious disease specialist hopefully you can put a stripe do you think even help with that certainly that's far away so you know let's go let's get your background on what's going on with the virus of me can you just sort of give us an update where we are yeah as you know there's a new virus that's emerged from China and almost certainly from the Hebei province from the city called Wuhan so initially the Vice was called the Wuhan virus I've got a proper name for it now it's called kovat 19 and that's the official name by the World Health Organization we think no it may have arisen from a live seafood and animal market in Wuhan ok so an animal transfer yeah we would think it's an animal transfer we 100% sure but probably probably because we know kernel viruses exist in certain animals and we know that other corona viruses like the MERS coronavirus that was they we're back in 2012-2013 last the Middle East and respiratory virus may have come from camels possibly and also there's the SARS virus we're back in 2002 and it's thought that came from possibly civet cats ok if I remember correctly wasn't there an animal connection with Ebola as well yeah yeah there is and and so we think that these viruses how cross over from species to species okay okay I mean that that makes a lot of sense because we've heard a lot of each one of these outbreaks seems to sort of definitely come from an origin place and there's an origin story with it in terms of what's going on at the moment there there's a lot of worry about the number of people infected and also the death toll that we've got in China um Ella Claire on youtubes asked why is the corona virus highly contagious and able to spread far more rapidly seeming than flus well it's not that contagious simple as that okay so we think and it's probable that the corona virus is spread by droplets from coughing or from sneezing or when people cough or sneeze and it sort of lands on what we call for mites so tables or other services and people are in contact with them and they touch their faces or they or the nose or the mouth okay it's not able the Conover virus is not like that in fact it's probably like the common cold which is not able on so so we have mentioned about people you know wearing masks and things but correct me if I'm wrong but my opinion is that a mask isn't going to do much to protect a patient from getting you know infection just walking down the street but as you said just that good hand hygiene making sure they're washing their hands potentially using alcoa gel that's how somebody protects themselves from getting this isn't it yeah absolutely because this drop has spread it's off of contact the services and then they mess about with their eyes or the nose or the mouth or people who might have influenza Walker advice Wilke often sneeze over people you know face to face like me and you are so face to face usually means about a meter but arm's length all right and that's when you get infected you know you don't get infected when you're walking down the street or walking through an airport okay it's close face-to-face contact when somebody coughs or sneezes and when you touch so when you wear a mask walking through an air but you know you're more likely to touch service that are infected and then you're more likely to touch your face your nose your eyes or mouth and I personally think masks are worse and increasing risk of infection particularly not in that context well currently I'm wrong but they only have a relatively short life span because they lose any benefit at all once they've gotten wet with moisture death particularly the particular surgical masks in the the FFP three must last a bit longer okay and they're useful when they weren't they useful they're useful for those who have symptoms too for those people to wear it so that they can protect other people so they don't infect them at the virus to other people it's also useful when you get a lot of spread of the virus in certain situations and that's in the healthcare facility and sue sue sue doctors and nurses and other health care workers should wear personal protective gear so go downs gloves masks okay and that's when it's useful for the ordinary Joe Bloggs walking down the street it's not helpful and often makes things worse that's really really interesting so people seem to almost have it backwards that the mask is actually potentially a risk factor and IIIi first don't think so because you're messing the baton II and often people don't have to use in Laska you know he's going to correctly fitted it's got a bit correct mask for example it's got it's gonna have the right filters and they use you the usual surgical masks are not that helpful and often people touched on the wrong parts of the mask and therefore that has the potential to contaminate the fingers and therefore they can infect themselves what's really important is simple hygiene that we you would exercise for the common cold and for influenza okay so in here in the UK we have the phrase to catch it pin it and kill it and it's very simple so you try and catch you with handkerchiefs or tissues if you don't have that you use your arm if you need to look good better than nothing so that's the catch it bit okay so then you Bennett you dispose of it properly in a bit right and then you kill it with you either use a alcohol gel or even better try and wash your hands good also Morton yeah super water okay for at least one it's 20 seconds and and these are important control measures to prevent the spread of cold influenza and the corona virus and this is what you need to do okay so you know all those people who've you know I saw a picture recently you know people having a sale on dust masks that's not going to do anything then make money for the person who doesn't ask is that I think so yeah you know like I said often they make things worse and increase fear they create hysteria but without much effectiveness okay that so Chaz is asked how dangerous actually is this coronavirus the news always makes things more dramatic than they are how worried should we be about a mask global outbreak okay the first things first no news and news media are there to make things dramatic okay and that's how things so adverts newspapers etc let's take a step back and look at the facts first of all as I said it's not that contagious it's by droplet spread secondly look at the context flu the World Health Organization estimates you know you know at least 3 million of 5 million cases over every year were annuals and we're always talking about someone saying oh I've got flu I feel terrible it's not a it's not a rare thing is it yeah and if it fits very common as you well know okay and you know we're both doctors we see patients all the time with influenza and how common it isn't in the flu season um the w-h-o estimate is about 290,000 to about 6 600,000 deaths per year that's got a lot okay that is a lot but in the grand scale of things that's if you like you like case fatality ratio so it's the number of deaths comparative number of cases it varies quite a lot depends on the virus and the season but it can be as low as 0.1 percent in a you know in a modern healthcare country or it can be as high as 10 percent in a year okay and it runs somewhere in between three to five percent now let's take a look at number of cases we have so far of the corona virus you've got he fed about about 50,000 cases in about 1300 deaths okay approximately okay because we're guessing no new updates every single day I don't think they're changing got some data okay and we've got some case series and that's less than three percent so 98 97 to 98 percent of people will survive okay you'll be fine the grand scale of things look flew around is around every year and it kills people and both diseases both infections tend to prey on the more viable people in society so the older people people who might have a weakened immune system or people who have other underlying medical conditions so cancer or heart disease or lung disease so actually the younger people have a milder disease so most people were fine so actually thinking about this perhaps all this press that we've got going on which is I do think that people are almost being harmed from a health anxiety perspective might actually prove to be a benefit if we can get more people taking up the flu vaccine because we know that's going to affect more people with no flu because more people right we know it has other effects you know it you're off work you did lots of productivity for a country kids go off school and kids go and spread to other vulnerable people so why not vaccinate when there is a flu vaccine it's there it's it's cheap it's simple its effective and it's well tolerated okay now I I come across this question so much at work and and I do push it back but as an infectious disease specialist how would you respond when someone says I don't know how I could ask I don't want to have the flu vaccine because it made me ill once it gave me flu well that's the interesting interesting question and first of all okay the flu vaccine that you get is a killed virus it's not live so you cannot get infected from this gnat all let's be completely clear about that I think what actually happens I think when you have a vaccine particular to viruses your body produces a chemical called interferon and that makes you feel a bit a run down okay but it's nothing compared to what you might get when you get proper flu you'll have high fever you'll be aching all over you'll be bed bound for a couple of days and you'll get off work for about a week so it's completely different I mean what when I did my PhD training one of my supervisors he who said oh the best diagnostic test for flu you put a 50 pound note on the floor if the patient can't be bothered to get it you know they've got laboratory that's not bad because because it just actually it makes you feel so rundown your bones urgh your muscles ache you just come well you did you just can't move okay are you just you just take to bed so that concludes the second part of this story about the novel coronavirus in China and hopefully gives us a little bit more of the background and more importantly the science behind some of the slightly alarmist newspaper articles and online features you might have seen I think dr. Gao has proved beyond a shadow of a doubt how knowledgeable he is in the field of infectious disease and hopefully is calm and clear information has helped calm some of their worry that people have had about this current a virus if you feel this video has been useful to you please consider sharing the video so we can actually try and get more people involved about discussing and learning about the virus so you can decide how bigger an impact and how concerned we actually need to be which is dr. Guerra is suggesting so far we need to be aware of that there are bigger issues out there for us to be aware of in the infectious disease world well have a good evening then join you in episode 3 and a couple of days time take care [Music]