Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
What are the symptoms caused by the virus from Wuhan in China, how is it transmitted from one person to another, and at what point should you see a doctor?
It is a novel coronavirus – that is to say, a member of the coronavirus family that has never been encountered before. Like other coronaviruses, it has come from animals. Many of those infected either worked or frequently shopped in the Huanan seafood wholesale market in the centre of the Chinese city, which also sold live and newly slaughtered animals. New and troubling viruses usually originate in animal hosts. Ebola and flu are examples.
It is a novel coronavirus – that is to say, a member of the coronavirus family that has never been encountered before. Like other coronaviruses, it has come from animals. Many of those infected either worked or frequently shopped in the Huanan seafood wholesale market in the centre of the Chinese city, which also sold live and newly slaughtered animals. New and troubling viruses usually originate in animal hosts. Ebola and flu are examples.
Footage has emerged appearing to show a man being forcibly removed from the Guangzhou metro by security staff for not wearing a face mask, after the South China province implemented a mandatory order to wear them amid the coronavirus crisis.
Chinese companies are working overtime to produce masks amid soaring demand caused by the country’s coronavirus outbreak.
US updates travel warning to China to highest level as mayor of Wuhan admits authorities were too slow in releasing information about virus. Follow the latest news
There are a few interesting sites tracking the increase in coronavirus cases. This one from John’s Hopkins university in the US is one of the best. It clearly shows the steep rise in confirmed infections each day in the past week, from around 280 on 20 January, to over 4,500 today.
One of the curious thing to come out of the Australian news conference about school advice with regards to coronavirus, is that speakers reiterated that there hasn’t been person-to-person transmission of the virus in Australia.
“There is no evidence,” said the NSW chief health officer, Kerry Chant.
Outbreaks such as coronavirus, Sars and Ebola have taught us communication is key, and that the world is only as strong as its weakest health system
A patient presents at an emergency department somewhere in the world. They are feverish and vomiting. Doctors suspect it is influenza, but they are wrong.
The head of the World Health Organization will hold a special meeting with officials in Beijing on Monday to discuss how to contain the coronavirus that has killed 80 people and left more than 400 in a critical condition.
In an effort to reduce chances of infection during what is China’s busiest travel season, officials announced the end of this week’s lunar new year holiday would be postponed until at least 2 February. Authorities have also widened sweeping restrictions on travel across the country.
UK government urged to reassure public that NHS is ready for cases within days
About 100,000 people could be infected with the new coronavirus around the world, experts have warned, as the UK government faced calls to reassure people that the NHS is ready to deal with any British cases within days.
Prof Neil Ferguson, a public health expert at Imperial College, said his “best guess” was that there were 100,000 affected by the virus even though there are only 2,000 confirmed cases so far, mostly in the city of Wuhan in China where the virus first appeared.
Worldwide health challenges serve as a grave warning to those who would bury their heads in isolationism
The world’s most populous country yesterday celebrated the lunar new year, usually a time of family reunion and joyful celebration. For many Chinese people who have moved away from their place of birth, it is the one time of year they get to visit their familiesThis year the coronavirus outbreak has profoundly muted the celebrations in China, with several cities in lockdown, the imposition of quarantine measures unprecedented in their scale, and many citizens anxious about their own health and that of their families.
The Chinese have borne the brunt of the outbreak so far: coronavirus is known to have killed more than 40 people, and infected another 1,300. But the first cases have already been recorded in the US, Australia, and – on Friday – in Europe.
Jonathan Ashworth, the UK’s shadow health secretary, urged the government to reassure the public it is sufficiently prepared as the NHS is already struggling in the flu season.
He told the Guardian:
The NHS is currently under immense strain this winter with staff already working flat out and hospitals overcrowded. We need urgent reassurance from ministers they have a plan to ensure we have capacity in place to deal with Coronavirus should we need to,
New research warns that ‘blue acceleration’ – a global goldrush to claim the ocean floor – is already impacting on the environment.
The scaly-foot snail is one of Earth’s strangest creatures. It lives more than 2,300 metres below the surface of the sea on a trio of deep-sea hydrothermal vents at the bottom of the Indian Ocean. Here it has evolved a remarkable form of protection against the crushing, grim conditions found at these Stygian depths. It grows a shell made of iron.
Discovered in 1999, the multi-layered iron sulphide armour of Chrysomallon squamiferum – which measures a few centimetres in diameter – has already attracted the interest of the US defence department, whose scientists are now studying its genes in a bid to discover how it grows its own metal armour.
China has expanded an unprecedented lockdown during the country’s most important holiday to 13 cities and at least 36 million people, as efforts to contain the deadly new coronavirus were stepped up around the world and the first cases were reported in Europe.
Restrictions on movement were widened on Friday in China in an effort to stop the spread of the disease. Late on Friday, authorities confirmed a further 15 deaths and 180 new cases of coronavirus, bringing the total number of fatalities to 41 people and more than 1,000 affected.
In hospitals across Wuhan, the city at the centre of the new coronavirus outbreak, there is panic and despair. Patients wearing masks queue for hours, waiting to be called by nurses. Staff who have worked endless shifts are forced to turn many away. Pharmacies are running out of supplies.
A lack of diagnostic tests means many people do not know for sure if their fever is the new strain of coronavirus, which has killed 26 people in China and affected more than 800.
Calls for stricter outlawing of the trafficking and consumption of wild game - which has been linked to the emergence of Coronavirus in Chinese cities - have been reverberating on Chinese social media.
An interesting piece from Jessica Colwell on What’s on Weibo, which reports on social media trends in China, reports that the Wuhan Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market which has been linked to the outbreak has been closed down but criticism of such markets has been fierce.
The hashtag “Support the banning of wild game markets” (#支持禁绝野味市场#) was topping the list of trending topics for much of Thursday and was viewed 270 million times.
Another hashtag, “The source of the new coronavirus is wild animals” (#新型冠状病毒来源是野生动物#), topped the list on Wednesday and has been viewed 990 million times. Online commenters are lambasting the practice of eating illegal wild game such as civet cats, the cause of the 2003 SARS virus, and bats, the suspected cause of the Wuhan coronavirus (snakes have also been suggested as a possible source of the coronavirus outbreak).
Britain’s public health authorities have put out these slides as part of an information campaign about the coronavirus outbreak
No confirmed cases of Wuhan coronavirus have been detected in the UK and the risk to the UK population is low. If you have travelled to the affected area, make sure you know what to do if you experience symptoms: https://t.co/vvIWp72flopic.twitter.com/hzV5A3dy4f
Nuclear and climate threats create ‘profoundly unstable’ world
Robinson: climate inaction is ‘death sentence for humanity’
The risk of civil collapse from nuclear weapons and the climate crisis is at a record high, according to US scientists and former officials, calling the current environment “profoundly unstable”.
Scientists discover vitrified remains caused by immense 520C heat of disaster in AD79
When Mount Vesuvius erupted in AD79, the damage wreaked in nearby towns was catastrophic. Now it appears the heat was so immense it turned one victim’s brain to glass – thought to be the first time this has been seen.
Experts say they have discovered that splatters of a shiny, solid black material found inside the skull of a victim at Herculaneum appear to be the remains of human brain tissue transformed by heat.
Chinese authorities have suspended all outbound transport from Wuhan, the city at the centre of an outbreak of the mysterious Sars-like coronavirus, which has so far killed 17 people.
Bus, subway, ferry and long-distance passenger transportation networks from the city were suspended from 10am local time on Thursday, state media reported. The city’s airport and train stations were also closed to outgoing passengers.
Telling lies is stressful. That’s the basic logic of a polygraph test: that the stress of deceiving others will manifest itself through fleeting physical responses that may be imperceptible to another person but can be measured by a machine. Typically, a polygraph records blood pressure, galvanic skin response (a proxy for sweat), breathing and pulse rate.
There is a fairly standard protocol for the lie detector examination. The examiner will mix specific questions relevant to a case – “Did you commit a robbery on 29 March?” – with a series of control questions. Crucially, the control questions are also designed to be anxiety-inducing – for instance: “Have you ever stolen from a friend?” Along the way, the subject will be reminded that the machine can distinguish truth from lies and that they must respond truthfully.
Three of the new cases are severe, with experts worried about the disease’s spread ahead of lunar new year
China reported 17 new cases of the mysterious Sars-like virus on Sunday, including three in a severe condition, heightening fears ahead of China’s lunar new year holiday, when hundreds of millions of people move around the country.
The new coronavirus strain has caused alarm because of its connection to severe acute respiratory syndrome, which killed nearly 650 people across mainland China and Hong Kong in 2002-03.