The Chinese city of Wuhan, the centre of the coronavirus outbreak, has begun the ambitious task of building a 1,000-bed hospital in just 10 days to treat victims of the epidemic.
To speed construction, the hospital is being built with prefabricated buildings around a holiday complex originally intended for local workers, set in gardens by a lake on the outskirts of the city.
Although the timescale is ambitious, China has form for constructing hospitals at short notice in response to major health crises. In 2003, during the Sars outbreak 7,000 workers in Beijing built the Xiaotangshan hospital in the northern suburbs in just a week. Wuhan authorities said the Xiaotangshan hospital, also built using prefabricated buildings, was the template for the new facility in Wuhan, being built on a 25,000 sq metre site.
What is the virus causing illness in Wuhan?
It is a member of the coronavirus family that has never been encountered before. Like other coronaviruses, it has come from animals, or possibly seafood. New and troubling viruses usually originate in animal hosts. Ebola and flu are examples.
What other coronaviruses have there been?
Severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) and Middle Eastern respiratory syndrome (Mers) are both caused by coronaviruses that came from animals.
What are the symptoms of the Wuhan coronavirus?
The virus causes pneumonia. Those who have fallen ill are reported to suffer coughs, fever and breathing difficulties. In severe cases there can be organ failure. As this is viral pneumonia, antibiotics are of no use. The antiviral drugs we have against flu will not work. If people are admitted to hospital, they may get support for their lungs and other organs as well as fluids. Recovery will depend on the strength of their immune system. Many of those who have died are known to have been already in poor health.
Is the virus being transmitted from one person to another?
Human to human transmission has been confirmed by China’s national health commission. As of 27 January, the Chinese authorities had acknowledged more than 2,700 cases and 56 deaths. In the past week, the number of confirmed infections has more than tripled and cases have been found in 13 provinces, as well as the municipalities of Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing and Tianjin. The virus has also been confirmed outside China, in Hong Kong, Macau, Japan, Nepal, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, the US, and Vietnam. There have not been any confirmed cases in the UK at present, with the 14 people tested for the virus all proving negative. The actual number to have contracted the virus could be far higher as people with mild symptoms may not have been detected. Modelling by WHO experts at Imperial College London suggests there could be as many as 100,000 cases, with uncertainty putting the margins between 30,000 and 200,000.
How worried are the experts?
There were fears that the coronavirus might spread more widely during the week-long lunar new year holidays, which start on 24 January, when millions of Chinese travel home to celebrate, but the festivities have largely been cancelled and Wuhan and other Chinese cities are in lockdown.
At what point should you go to the doctor if you have a cough, say?
Unless you have recently travelled to China or been in contact with someone infected with the virus, then you should treat any cough or cold symptoms as normal. The NHS advises that there is generally no need to visit a doctor for a cough unless it is persistent or you are having other symptoms such as chest pain, difficulty breathing or you feel very unwell.
Should we panic?
No. The spread of the virus outside China is worrying but not an unexpected development. It increases the likelihood that the World Health Organization will declare the outbreak to be a public health emergency of international concern on Thursday evening. The key concerns are how transmissible this new coronavirus is between people and what proportion become severely ill and end up in hospital.
Sarah Boseley Health editor and Hannah Devlin
The hospital in the Chinese capital featured individual isolation units that looked like rows of tiny cabins. Within two months, it treated a seventh of all the country’s Sars patients, the Changjiang Daily said, describing it as “a miracle in the history of medical science”. The facility closed less than two months after it was judged that a decisive victory had been won against Sars in China.
Building machinery, including 35 diggers and 10 bulldozers, arrived at the Wuhan site on Thursday night, with the aim of getting the new facility ready by Monday 3 February, state media reported. Earlier reports had suggested the hospital would be completed in under a week.
China State Construction Engineering, one of the companies building the hospital, said on Friday it had more than 100 workers on the site.
Images on state television showed a flurry of activity at the muddy site with dozens of diggers painted in various colours hard at work preparing the ground, as a stream of trucks ferried in materials and equipment.
Using temporary buildings not only facilitates swift construction but it also keeps the cost down.
Xinhua said the new facility was aimed at “alleviating the shortage of medical treatment resources and improving the ability to care for patients”.
Construction in Wuhan began as reports surfaced of bed shortages in hospitals designated for dealing with the outbreak, which has infected 830 people across China and killed 26. People who sought treatment in the city this week told the Guardian they had been turned away from hospitals, which have been inundated with patients. Facilities are reportedly running out of beds and diagnostic kits for patients who present with fever-like symptoms. At least eight hospitals in Wuhan issued public calls for donations of masks, googles, gowns and other protective medical gear, according to notices online.
Administrators at Wuhan university people’s hospital set up a group chat on the popular WeChat messaging app to coordinate donations.
Sars, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, killed 349 people in mainland China and 299 in Hong Kong in 2002-2003.
