COVID-19 or coronavirus disease is a viral respiratory disease. The virus spreads through contaminated droplets that are released when an infected person sneezes, coughs, or from his saliva. Although most people get infected with the virus, they may or may not feel symptoms and recover without special treatment. However, there is a large number of patients who suffered from severe illness, and most of them died. Emerging from Wuhan, China, in December 2019, COVID spread widely in the whole world within months, due to which the world witnessed an uncertain situation.
Symptoms:
Following are the common symptoms of coronavirus but the symptoms are not limited to the below mentioned ones. There may be some other symptoms also. In case of suspect, you must consult doctor as soon as possible.
- Chills or fever
- Tiredness
- Nausea or vomiting
- Cough
- Difficulty breathing
- Headaches
- Loss of taste or smell
- Sore throat
- Congestion or runny nose
- Diarrhea
- Muscle or body pain
After exposure to the virus, symptoms may appear between two to fourteen days. Usually, children have milder symptoms of the same kind as adults. People who already have some respiratory issues or illness, diabetes, and heart diseases are more prone to catching the coronavirus. Similarly, aged people have more chances of complications than adults and youngsters, but varying symptoms in different cases have been observed all around the world.
Outspread of the virus:
The virus spread massively among the world population, and out of the seven continents, six got affected. The only continent that remained saved from coronavirus is Antarctica. As the virus was not known to the scientists, it created panic for a while in the whole world. Researchers speeded up their research processes to learn more about this virus to fight it efficiently and minimize human life loss. The number of cases all over the world change on an hourly basis, and it is tough to tell the exact number of coronavirus-affected cases. It is because, along with reported cases, there are numerous unreported cases that get affected and die without coming into the knowledge of the government and concerned authorities.
Still, organizations like World Health Organization (WHO) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) continuously gather data and information to drive the best outcomes that help in fighting this outbreak. According to recent reports, more than 130,000,000 people got infected with the virus, out of which more than 2,800,000 died all around the world. If we look country-wise, the USA reported the most cases in the world that were around 30,500,000 as of this writing, with more than 550,000 deaths. Brazil was also severely affected by the coronavirus and is still suffering from its effects. The cases reported there were more than 12,700,000 and deaths around 320,000. Some other countries’ stats are as follows; India with 12,200,000 cases, England and Russia have more than 4,300,000 cases, France 4,700,000, Italy over 3,600,000, Turkey and Spain over 3,300,000 and 3,200,000 cases respectively.
Why was second wave stronger?
The first wave of COVID-19 emerged in December 2019 and prevailed for about eight to nine months. It increased gradually, and we saw a humungous rise in the summers. That was the time when the whole world witnessed a worldwide lockdown. Travel bans were imposed, flight operation was terminated, offices, schools, colleges, universities were closed, and some industries were shut down. The aim of all these policies was to minimize social interaction that involves physically meeting someone. As a result of strict policies and ensuring their compliance by people, governmental authorities were successful in controlling the spread of coronavirus to a significant level. This was an outstanding achievement that the concerned authorities should have maintained, but it was contrary to this.
As the number of cases started decreasing, people demanded lifting lockdown as they were facing heavy economic loss in terms of monetary loss and educational loss. Governments also wanted to ease the restriction so that economic activities can run smoothly. During the lockdown, governments had to spend more money on subsidies, relief programs, etc., to keep the economy running. For the purpose of pushing the economy forward, restrictions were lifted or eased, and things started coming back to normal. Although citizens were advised to follow SOPs strictly, the number of people following this instruction was meager. People thought that they had passed the storm and there is no more danger.
Trying to revive the life before the pandemic, people starting socializing even more than usual to compensate for the year passed in lockdown. It had dire effects on the conditions and resulted in a much stronger second wave of coronavirus. This time we saw an increased rate of infections from the beginning. The rate of people contracting coronavirus on a daily basis elevated to the sky. This is not the story of a country. Still, the whole world faced the same situation: under-developed and developing countries like Africa, South Asia, or highly developed countries such as the USA and UK. Unfortunately, the countries previously handling the pandemic very well faced the worst situation in the second wave. They recorded double or even triple more cases per day. This was clearly due to negligence towards the safety measures. As a result, health systems collapsed. Hospitals were unable to cater to the needs of increasing patients. At that crucial point, governments were bound not to put restrictions again. They had economic pressure from different industries and businesses such as traveling and tourism, restaurants, educational institutions, retail, and service sectors that had not recovered from the first lockdown effects. However, some of those businesses even shut down forever due to a lack of resources to keep their operations running.
It would not be wrong to say that the responsibility for the large-scale outspread of coronavirus in the second wave mainly relies on people and their irresponsible attitude towards others’ personal safety and safety. Not giving health its due concern resulted in people losing their lives and suffering from economic, social, and mental trauma. The only way to save yourself and others from this lethal virus is to follow necessary precautions.
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I am working as a writer at the assignment writing uk for 6 six years and completed my education from the Southborough University