Short Note Regarding Coronavirus You May Don't Know
Coronavirus is a relatively new viral disease that now infects more than 250,000 people around the world each year. Of the one hundred cases that have been reported in the UK, one-third have been fatal.
The disease may become increasingly important in the western world in the coming years as a result of developments in surveillance.
However there is only one organization monitoring the progression of the disease, and this disease will likely be completely invisible to the global surveillance programs.
This is the first in a series of articles looking at the state of microbiology in the UK, and what monitoring organizations need to look for to stay in touch with the disease and develop treatments.
The Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN) was launched by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in 2004. Its purpose is to respond to infectious disease outbreaks in public health in member states, making sure all relevant health and related agencies have a unified mechanism to share information and collaborate in the fight against infectious disease. GOARN currently monitors more than 700 diseases and more than 100 epidemics.
Until very recently, there was no mechanism in place for the UK to monitor the progression of Coronavirus. The last record of a case of the disease was from February 2001.
David Yeates, head of microbiology at the University of Oxford, led a government advisory group looking at the risk of coronavirus developing in the UK in 2007. He was particularly interested in what was happening to any remaining disease in the UK related to coronaviruses.
Following the report, the Public Health England (PHE) was formed in May 2008. In addition to collecting and analyzing environmental samples, the Government also commissioned the Review of Coronavirus in the United Kingdom (RCUK CRIS) to look at how coronavirus might spread in the future.
This study, the first of its kind, analyzed disease databases for all coronaviruses in the UK. It found that the infection is not being picked up in routine clinical surveillance. It also found that healthcare workers are at risk of contracting the disease in particular.
Biomedical research funding is increasingly being placed on the priority of finding new treatments. Coronavirus research received approximately £4m of funding from the UK National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) in 2007. By this time, there were 19 laboratory-based studies of coronavirus in Europe.
