How Contagious Is The Coronavirus?
The latest data points to “very”
This is the latest in our ongoing coverage of the fast-developing coronavirus outbreak originating in Wuhan, China. Our goal is to provide timely and science-based clarity on the situation for those overwhelmed by the many confusing & conflicting reports swirling in the media. If this is the first article of ours you’re reading on the subject, we recommend also reviewing our primer on the coronavirus.
There’s currently a bit of a kerfuffle on Twitter. It’s over an R0 study on ‘2019-ncov’, which is the official designation for the Wuhan coronavirus (as a reminder, R0 is a measure of how contagious a virus is).
The study is creating a stir because it initially reported an R0 of 3.8, but then was swiftly downgraded to 2.5.
First, it’s important to know that an R0 of 2.5 is still very bad. That’s at the top end of previously reported ranges that were in my video alert from yesterday.
This specific Tweet garnered a lot of attention because a Harvard trained epidemiologist used some very inflammatory language:
So who is Dr Ting?
He’s a Harvard trained epidemiologist:
Dr. Ting was reacting to a new study that estimated the coronavirus’ R0 using available data. Here’s the Twitter thread he posted:
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
