ABSTRACT

It is sad to hear discussions among the president of the International Union of Immunological Societies and the presidents of 15 other national immunology societies¹. Their actions against COVID-19 to individual government leaders were not swift. Inconsistent and slow prevention against COVID-19 may prolong the pandemic worldwide. The best surveillance should be implemented in the world as soon as possible.

KEYWORDS

COVID-19; SARS; airborne; air travel; receptor ACE2; asymptomatic and presymptomatic

It is sad to hear discussions among the president of the International Union of Immunological Societies and the presidents of 15 other national immunology societies¹. Their actions against COVID-19 to individual government leaders were not swift. SARS-CoV-2 was named after SARS by WHO on Feb. 112020². From Feb. 11, expert scientists who should know the past lessons from SARS 17 years ago and MERS 8 years ago respectively should disseminate that SARS-Cov-2 is an airborneinfection virus which spreads person to person ^3,4. They should also disseminate how to effectively prevent the airborne infection transmission. They should also ban air travel ⁴.

Hoffmann et al. discovered that SARS-CoV-2 uses the SARS-CoVreceptor ACE2 for host cell entry on April 16in 2020⁵.

For mitigating the COVID-19 pandemic, the expert scientists should disseminate to the world on isolation of COVID-19asymptomatic and presymptomatic patients.

They should also disseminate there is still no vaccine for SARS and MERS despite dozens of attempts to develop them⁶. Since there is no vaccine for COVID-19, urgent isolation is an only strategy for mitigating the pandemic where the robust surveillance withpatient’s detection plays a key role.

Inconsistent and slow prevention against COVID-19 may prolong the pandemic worldwide. The best surveillance should be implemented in the world as soon as possible.

References:

1.Osier, F., Ting, J.P.Y., Fraser, J. et al. The global response to the COVID-19 pandemic: how have immunology societies contributed? Nat Rev Immunol 20, 594–602 (2020).https://doi.org/10.1038/s41577-020-00428-4

2.https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/technical-guidance/naming-the-coronavirus-disease-(covid-2019)-and-the-virus-that-causes-it

3.https://www.who.int/csr/resources/publications/ICHC_booklet_FINAL.pdf

4. https://www.who.int/health-topics/severe-acute-respiratory-syndrome#tab=tab_1

5. Hoffmann et al., 2020, Cell,181,271–280, April 16, 2020

6.https://www.mountsinai.org/about/newsroom/2020/itn-there-was-no-vaccine-for-sars-or-mers-will-there-be-one-for-the-new-coronavirus-josephine-ma-and-simone-mccarthy