New virus named, SARS lessons learned

The new coronavirus – the subject of countless, often-panicky, news reports – now has a name. Researchers in England are calling it London1_novel CoV2012. But there’s not a lot else that can be said with certainty except that so far just two patients with the virus have come to the attention of doctors and public health authorities, who are diligently applying the lessons learned a decade ago during the SARS epidemic. Open questions, according to the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control, include: Where it came from and where it is usually found – its “source” and “reservoir”; How it’s transmitted; How long it takes from infection to the appearance of symptoms; Whether infection can occur without symptoms. It’s not even certain – although it’s a good assumption – that it actually caused the disease that killed a 60-year-old Saudi man and has put a 49-year-old Qatari man in intensive care in the U.K. The first coronavirus,...