February 20, 2020

expert comments on China reporting on Thursday 20th February the lowest number of new confirmed cases of COVID-19 since late January

China reported on Thursday 20th February the lowest number of new confirmed cases of COVID-19 since late January, with this number reportedly reduced because some initially confirmed clinical cases then showed negative results in nucleic acid tests so were subtracted.

Prof Rowland Kao, Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies and Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh, said:

“While it’s unwise to speculate as to the exact reason why the change would occur, there are very good reasons why a more precise case definition is helpful to aid disease control.  For example, if falsely identified cases are too many, this may result in logistical resources becoming unduly strained.  Where key health workers are involved, reduction in staffing (where staff are falsely identified) may have a particularly strong impact.”

Dr Bharat Pankhania, of the University of Exeter Medical School, said:

“The potential return to what appears to be only counting the clinically confirmed cases in Hubei will not surprisingly give us only the peak of the pyramid snapshot of the actual number of cases.

“It’s important that scientists, decision makers and others are fully aware of this counting method and for the press to also be aware that for every case we are aware of in China, there will likely be several more clinical cases by many factors, ranging from three to 10 times the actual number of cases in China.

“In these circumstances, we will also start to get a skewed picture of the illness patterns.  We expect that only the very ill will be seen, and have a clinical sample taken.  We have to be aware that there are many more who have become ill, had an illness and most probably got better without any records.  It’s important that authorities do not interpret this as a slowing of the outbreak and let their guard down prematurely.”

* http://en.nhc.gov.cn/2020-02/20/c_76730.htm

All our previous output on this subject can be seen at this weblink:

http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/tag/covid-19

The SMC also produced a Factsheet on COVID-19 which is available here:

https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/smc-novel-coronavirus-factsheet/

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