How Did The Coronavirus Start? (Nam)

How—and When—Will the COVID-19 Pandemic End?
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How did the coronavirus start? (Nam)

The outbreak began in Wuhan, China - a city with a population of over 11
million.
The virus is believed to have originated from a "wet market" where animals
such as bats, snakes, rabbit and birds are illegally sold.
Humans as well as animals - both living and dead - are put together in close
contact in wet markets in often unhygienic conditions.
As the coronavirus is known to be transferred from animals to humans, it is
believed market stallholders, who came into contact with animals were the
first people infected with the strain.
A 61-year-old frequent shopper at the wet market was the first person to die
from the virus.
Shortly after the spread of the disease, officials in China imposed a
nationwide ban on the buying and selling of wild animals in markets,
restaurants and other retail places.
Although experts are yet to identify the animal source of the virus, bats are
widely believed to be the original hosts.
How far has it spread? (Nam)

The virus has spread widely across the world with cases often doubling in a
day in several countries.
China, its epicentre, remains the biggest hit with more than 81,000 cases and
3,281 deaths.
Meanwhile in Europe, Italy has recorded more than 69,000 cases with 6,820
deaths while Spain has over 47,000 cases and 3,434 dead.
The UK has so far recorded more than 8,000 cases of the virus with 427
deaths.
In Viet Nam, 251 people have caught the virus, 122 people have recovered
and none of them died from it so far. (8th April 2020)
How—and When—Will the COVID-19 Pandemic End? (Khải)
In many ways, the COVID-19 pandemic has proven to be a moving target.

Faced with stopping a pandemic scientists have yet to fully understand,
researchers simply can’t guarantee what lies ahead—or when life will return
to a version of normalcy.
But as businesses continue to shutter and people retreat into their homes,
one thing has become clear: To stem the spread of disease, Joe Pinsker
reports for the Atlantic, strict measures that keep people physically
separated could be in place for several months—perhaps even more than a
year.
These social disruptions are severe, alarming and difficult to fully

comprehend. They also come at an immense psychological cost. Already,
mere weeks of closures and separations have taken an immense toll on the
world’s wellbeing, sparking major financial losses, widening socioeconomic
inequalities and exacerbating the health burden on vulnerable groups.
Experts warn that this is the price that must be paid to stop the pandemic.
Not because the costs we’re paying now are negligible, but because what
stands to be lost is so immense. The United States now has the most
confirmed infections of any nation in the world, surpassing 100,000 cases
and 1,500 deaths in total on the evening of Friday, March 27—and it's not
yet known when the country will reach peak for new cases. So what happens
next?
Immunity is key (Lộc)
When enough of the global population becomes immune, SARS-CoV-2

will lose its infectious toehold, failing to find enough new, susceptible
individuals to infect before leaving its current hosts. Researchers
estimate that about 2.5 to 5 billion people—roughly a third to two-
thirds of the global population—will need to be immune to hit this
critical threshold, Jonathan Lambert reports for Science News.
Two possible paths to immunity exist, neither of which is guaranteed.

In one, individuals who recover from COVID-19 produce the immune
molecules required to fight off the virus, should it try to infect them
again. In the other, people become immune by getting vaccinated,
teaching their bodies to recognize and destroy the invader without
getting sick.
Both resolutions hinge on whether an exposure to SARS-CoV-2, or at

least, pieces of it, can protect a person from future infection, which has
yet to be shown definitively in the long term.
Flattening the curve (Khang)
Though many COVID-19 vaccines are now in development, this

process takes many months—often years. In the meantime, officials
worldwide are scrambling to reduce the rate at which new infections
arise to avoid overwhelming an already strained healthcare system.
That’s the idea behind “flattening the curve” of the pandemic’s

trajectory: If the virus has fewer opportunities to hop from person to
person, communities won’t see a big, rapid spike in new cases;
instead, new cases would be spread out over a longer stretch of time,
reducing the average number of people sickened with COVID-19 on a
given date. Drawing out the pandemic’s timeline also allows
researchers to develop much-needed treatments and tests.
The first step to achieving this slowdown is social distancing:

drastically reducing contact with individuals, in this case by keeping at
least six feet away from others—a distance that largely avoids the
infectious droplets sprayed out of the airway of those infected with
SARS-CoV-2. (Some psychologists have advocated for the use of the
less isolating term “physical distancing” to encourage people to
remain socially connected while physically apart.)
Given the infection’s weeks-long trajectory and the virus’ extreme

ease of spreading, distancing is not something that will work
instantaneously. The tactic effectively starves the pandemic of hosts—
something that takes time, and could quickly be thrown off should
some subsets of the population waver in their commitment.
If, for instance, distancing measures were relaxed too soon, SARS-CoV-

2 could roar back in a still-susceptible population, extending the
pandemic’s timeline even farther.
Our battle with COVID-19 will likely extend far beyond that, especially
if SARS-CoV-2 waxes and wanes with the seasons, or our immunity to
the virus doesn’t hold up for more than a few months or years.
Until a vaccine becomes available, the world may be in limbo with

distance policies tightening and relaxing when COVID-19 flares up or
subsides, according to Gideon Lichfield at MIT Technology Review.

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How—and When—Will the COVID-19 Pandemic End?

How did the coronavirus start? (Nam)

How far has it spread? (Nam)

In many ways, the COVID-19 pandemic has proven to be a moving target.

These social disruptions are severe, alarming and difficult to fully

Immunity is key (Lộc)

When enough of the global population becomes immune, SARS-CoV-2

Two possible paths to immunity exist, neither of which is guaranteed.

Both resolutions hinge on whether an exposure to SARS-CoV-2, or at

Flattening the curve (Khang)

Though many COVID-19 vaccines are now in development, this

That’s the idea behind “flattening the curve” of the pandemic’s

The first step to achieving this slowdown is social distancing:

Given the infection’s weeks-long trajectory and the virus’ extreme

If, for instance, distancing measures were relaxed too soon, SARS-CoV-

Until a vaccine becomes available, the world may be in limbo with

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