14 percent of recovered patients in Guangdong were test positive

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Recovered COVID19 patients testing positive not equal to coronavirus revival

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It is very likely to coexist with humans like the flu

Cases in which recovered patients of novel coronavirus pneumonia are tested positive in later check-ups do not mean the return of the coronavirus in their body, following media reports that 13 recovered patients in South China's Guangdong Province were tested positive again after being discharged from hospitals.

However, it's worth paying close attention, but there's no need to panic, experts said. 

Guangdong health authorities said on Tuesday that 13 COVID-19 patients recovered and discharged from hospitals were tested positive again in later check-ups, and about 14 percent of recovered patients were test positive later.  

The province has 844 patients recovered and discharged from hospitals as of Wednesday. 

The health authority also said that none of the 13 people showed renewed symptoms, and the nucleic acid test results of 104 close contacts of these patients were found negative, which means they were not infected. 

Some netizens doubt whether there's a need to recalibrate the criteria for defining what constitutes a recovered patient.

In an interview with Caixin, Cai Weiping, director of the Infectious Diseases Division of the No.8 People's Hospital in Guangzhou, disclosed the positive results were all found from anal samples, and the results were actually in the "weak positive" range.

Zeng Guang, chief epidemiologist of the China Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Beijing, told the Global Times on Wednesday that what caused the results of being tested positive is key to the problem. 

If a live virus is found in feces of recovered patients, then nationwide vigilance is needed as it shows that the patients were not fully recovered and they may infect others, experts said.

Cai told Caixin that it is unknown whether it's the live virus or virus fragments that caused the positive results, and it's likely that the test results may be inaccurate considering the impurities in the feces samples.

Yang Zhanqiu, deputy director of the pathogen biology department at Wuhan University, believes that the treatment guideline for COVID-19 should be updated with times. However, he said it is reasonable not to include fecal testing in the test to decide whether a patient recovers and can be discharged.

The latest national treatment guideline says the recovery and discharging requires patients to pass the tests of lungs CT images, respiratory symptoms, body temperature, and two consecutive negative nucleic acid tests of respiratory specimens. Top health authorities also required recovered patients to quarantine at home for 14 days, and come to the hospital for check-ups on the second and fourth weeks after release.

"The tests are very sensitive that even a virus fragment could theoretically make the test positive," Yang said. 

"But virus fragments on the feces also potentially indicate the coronavirus is still alive in the patient's body, or sample feces are polluted by fragments from somewhere else, especially when a patient shows no symptoms and the test takes place two weeks after discharge," said Yang.

Typically, there is no live virus in the patient's body about 10 days after being recognized as recovered, Yang said, also noting that the situation in Guangdong remains to be observed with caution.

Source: Global Times

https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1180874.shtml

Coronavirus pneumonia might exist for long time

The pneumonia caused by the novel coronavirus might exist for a long time, like the flu, said Wang Chen, president of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences.

"The new virus is different from SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome), the latter of which is highly transmissive and pathogenic. It quickly kills the host, and the virus itself cannot easily survive," he said during an interview with China Central Television on Wednesday night.

However, the pneumonia is very likely to coexist with humans like the flu, he said, adding that preparations in terms of clinical diagnosis and treatment should be made accordingly, as well as prevention measures in daily life.

Though more treatments and medicine have been adopted to cure the disease, it's still in early exploratory phases, according to Wang.

"It's a brand-new disease, the pathology of which is not yet clear. The previous treatment was based on the past experiences," he said, adding that the therapies are now more effective and standardized with a deeper understanding.

The current knowledge about the disease is still limited, and the exploration of new drugs and new therapies are still in the preliminary stage as well, he added.

Wang also noted that the spread of the new virus is slowing down, but the predication of a turning point for the epidemic has to take the regulation of the disease and the control and prevention measures into consideration.

"The inflection point is a dependent variable. It is important that we control its independent variables," he said.

Wang also said that it's important to admit patients into hospitals as soon as possible since a late admission of a patient could lead to more infections.

Thanks to the increase of hospital beds, the patient admission rate has gradually been improved. But it's crucial to put patients under treatment in a timely manner to curb the spread of the new virus, he added.

Source: China Daily

https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202002/20/WS5e4e0160a310128217278fb1.html

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