Question: A Novel Coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) That Emerged From Wuhan, China In 2019 Is Currently Causing A Worldwide Panic, With Many Governments Resorting To Mandatory Quarantines And Travel Restrictions. Most Of What We Know About COVID-19, The Disease Caused By SARS-CoV-2, Has Been Derived From General Scientific Knowledge About Related Coronaviruses And From …

A novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) that emerged from Wuhan, Chinain 2019 is currently causing a worldwide panic, with manygovernments resorting to mandatory quarantines and travelrestrictions. Most of what we know about COVID-19, the diseasecaused by SARS-CoV-2, has been derived from general scientificknowledge about related coronaviruses and from clinicalpublications and data derived from the disease’s epicenter inWuhan.

Covid-19 spreads very quickly because infected individualstypically do not show symptoms for 5-7 days post-infection. In mostindividuals, particularly under the age of 30, the symptoms areextremely mild, more resembling a cold or flu, and often gounnoticed and likely unreported. The more severe cases, which canlead to fatality, occur in patients that are over 65 years of age,or over 40 years of age with one or more comorbidities. Inparticular, individuals with underlying hypertension, heartdisease, respiratory disease, or diabetes are at a much higher riskof developing severe symptoms. In addition, males are nearly twiceas likely to develop more severe symptoms than are women, forreasons that are still not understood.

The patients who develop more severe symptoms develop what isreferred to as acute respiratory distress syndrome, or ARDS, muchas patients infected with the previous coronaviruses SARS-CoV andMERS did.

Based on your knowledge of the pathophysiology of respiratorydisorders, inflammation, and the adaptive immune system, what doyou think the overall pathophysiological mechanism of ARDS is, andwhat are the current best treatment practices?