Wuhan corona virus can spread through eyes

The deadly coronavirus could be spread through patients' eyes, a top doctor has warned after becoming infected with the disease.

Wang Guangfa, from Beijing's Peking University First Hospital, confirmed he had contracted the flu-like virus in a social media post on Wednesday.

The respected medic was a leading figure in China's battle against the SARS virus in 2002 and 2003.

He now believes he caught the disease because he didn't wear protective eyewear.

https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/world-news/china-coronavirus-spread-through-eyes-21351718

3.8? Ouch...

In December 2019, a novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) is thought to have emerged into the human population in Wuhan, China. The number of identified cases in Wuhan has increased rapidly since, and cases have been identified in other Chinese cities and other countries (as of 23 January 2020). We fitted a transmission model to reported case information up to 21 January to estimate key epidemiological measures, and to predict the possible course of the epidemic, as the potential impact of travel restrictions into and from Wuhan. We estimate the basic reproduction number of the infection (R_0) to be 3.8 (95% confidence interval, 3.6-4.0), indicating that 72-75% of transmissions must be prevented by control measures for infections to stop increasing. We estimate that only 5.1% (95%CI, 4.8-5.5) of infections in Wuhan are identified, and by 21 January a total of 11,341 people (prediction interval, 9,217-14,245) had been infected in Wuhan since the start of the year. Should the epidemic continue unabated in Wuhan, we predict the epidemic in Wuhan will be substantially larger by 4 February (191,529 infections; prediction interval, 132,751-273,649), infection will be established in other Chinese cities, and importations to other countries will be more frequent. Our model suggests that travel restrictions from and to Wuhan city are unlikely to be effective in halting transmission across China; with a 99% effective reduction in travel, the size of the epidemic outside of Wuhan may only be reduced by 24.9% on 4 February. Our findings are critically dependent on the assumptions underpinning our model, and the timing and reporting of confirmed cases, and there is considerable uncertainty associated with the outbreak at this early stage. With these caveats in mind, our work suggests that a basic reproductive number for this 2019-nCoV outbreak is higher compared to other emergent coronaviruses, suggesting that containment or control of this pathogen may be substantially more difficult.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.01.23.20018549v1

"We estimate that only 5.1% (95%CI, 4.8-5.5) of infections in Wuhan are identified,"

   A bit startling.

Most viruses can be passed through the eyes. It's one of the leading ways the common cold is transmitted. If the common cold were deadly we'd all be SOL because of how often we touch our eyes and just our faces in general.

Back in H1N1 days I bought a good pair of swimmers googles,they have a tight fitting gasket and slim enough to wear shades over them.

I had a conversation with a reliable source yesterday (prominent U.S. physician with good professional ties to/understanding of China and this type of virus). This person wouldn't go super deep (for obvious reasons) but did say that situation in China is significantly worse than is being reported (no surprise there but always nice to have hunches verified) AND any U.S. folks overseas traveling in Asia (not just Wuhan/China but also places like Japan and Hong Kong) who are middle aged or older are more at risk than any children (at this time it really is going for older patients). Indeed, the response about folks traveling in the region on public transportation (including flights back to the U.S.) was "not good."

I know that's not a great deal of info but given the source I took it very seriously. Made me think that quarantine for anyone coming in from Asia is in order but that's not going to happen.