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In December 2019, an unknown disease was discovered in Wuhan, China. Since then, the new coronavirus has been raging and causing numerous casualties. How on earth has it spread all over the world and what are the measures against it now?


Coronavirus is one of the three major viruses that cause colds in animals. Generally, coronaviruses cause mild nose cold symptoms in animals. Then why is the new coronavirus is so threatening that it kills many people?


The new coronavirus, which can be inferred from its name, is a new kind of coronavirus that has been created by genetic modification of the virus in order to survive as the human domain becomes wider.


There are seven species of coronavirus that can be transmitted to humans, and four of them cause only mild symptoms of infection. But the other three are different.


They are SARS (SARS-CoV), MERS (MERS-CoV), and Coronavirus disease 2019 (SARS-CoV-2, Severe painory sydrome caonavirus), which we are familiar with.


The three viruses are viruses that have hit the world and caused numerous deaths. Since it is first detected in Wuhan and the symptoms of pneumonia are palpable, coronavirus 19 is also called Wuhan pneumonia.


There are various symptoms of the coronavirus. Symptoms such as fever (99%), coughing (76%), muscle pain (44%), breathing difficulties (55%), and bleeding (5%), which is the same as cold are also present.


Therefore, it is often confused with colds, and there are also people with no symptoms at times, so special attention is needed. The general coronavirus is a highly contagious but low fatality virus.


However, coronavirus 19, which causes severe pneumonia, shows a high fatality rate of 3.4 percent as of March 9, 2020, just like MERS and SARS.


The cause of the initial occurrence and the propagation path are still unclear. There are many theories about this, and it was the theory of natural occurrence that received the greatest support in the early years.


Since Wuhan Hwanan fish wholesale market sells all kinds of wild animals alive as food ingredients, the wild animals were cited as the source of infection. It is difficult for different species to have a significant impact in a short period of time.


But in this market, both unhygienic slaughtering and distribution made it a good environment for germs to spread to each other and cause mutations, and it is highly likely that they were exposed to humans. On February 23, however, a study showed that coronavirus 19 entered the market from elsewhere and spread within the market.


But this, too, should not be blindly believed because it is not a confirmed fact as a result of a limited sample. Another widely supported theory is that the virus was leaked from the Wuhan Virus Institute. Wuhan Virus Institute is not far from Hwanan fish market, and is a facility with the highest risk of pathogens, where experiments on primates are relatively free, which are banned in other countries.


These reasons gave a boost to the theory. However, this is also a situation that cannot be determined yet because there is no direct evidence. There are also other speculations that the Hwanan fish market has nothing to do with the epicenter.


What is certain is that COVID-19 was discovered on December 1, 2019 in Wuhan, Hubei Province and was first reported on December 12, 2019. From January, the number of infections began to increase rapidly as people moved in large numbers due to the overlapping of China's big New Year's holiday.


Therefore On January 23, 2020, the first outbreak city of Wuhan was sealed off, but it began to spread widely not only in China but also abroad. So how did it spread to Korea? Korea had its first definite diagnosis case on January 20.


The problem occurred on February 19, when a woman in her 60s from Daegu who was identified as a definite diagnosis case went to worship of a Korean false religion called Sincheonji. The patient was hospitalized in a car accident and had abnormal symptoms, but visited health center after two rejection of the test.


In the meantime, she went to worship of the Shincheonji service where countless people sat on the floor, as well as visiting the hotel buffet without permission. This resulted in 20 additional definite diagnosis case at once on Feb. 19, a day after she was confirmed.


The following day, the number of definite diagnosis cases rose 53 from the previous day to 104 on Feb. 20. Korea, which had only 31 definite diagnosis cases in a month, has seen an exponential increase in definite diagnosis cases since then, recording 7,313 definite diagnosis cases as of 11 p.m. on March 9, 2020.


The figure is right behind China (80696 cases) that Corona first developed. The fact that Shincheonji was uncooperative in inspections and frequently visited ordinary churches and many places for missionary work were the biggest reasons for Korea's sudden increase in the number of definite diagnosis cases.


However, the number of deaths is small compared to the number of confirmed patients. As of March 9, 2020, the number of deaths in South Korea stood at 53, with the death rate of COVID-19 remaining relatively low at 0.7 percent compared to 3.4 percent on world's average.


COVID-19 wasn't just about causing pneumonia and hurting people's bodies. When the coronavirus first broke out, Western people's anathema to Asians reached a fever pitch because the first outbreak was China, and some Asians who had visited the West or were living in the West had to suffer from irrational discrimination.


In South Korea, there has also been a certain area abhorrence phenomenon. Daegu, where the first confirmed and the Shincheonji Church are located, had to suffer from mockery and signs such as "no entry from Daegu" in other regions.


And of course, the economy has also been depressed as many factories have been shut down and citizens who refrain from going out have been spending less. China's tourism industry is estimated to have suffered losses of about 154 trillion won and 72 trillion won in food and beverage consumption over the two months because of the spread of COVID-19.


As China's imports and exports, the biggest victim and economic power, decline, neighboring countries are also suffering greatly. Korea, in particular, is expected to be hit hard as it depends heavily on its neighbor China's economy, which the OECD has downgraded Korea's economic growth to 2.0 percent. In addition, South Korea's credit card spending plunged by half in February 2020 from a year earlier.


The self-employed as well as the entire economy are complaining of pain. As the importance of the use of masks is emphasized, the lack of masks is also getting worse. The problem is that there are many people who want to take advantage of this situation, such as hoarding masks at a much higher price than before.


In addition, more and more people are suffering from self-isolation due to corona, aka “corona depression”. They complain of depression and closeness as they cannot go outside and communicate with others.


Currently, Cheongju University is also working on countermeasures against Corona by postponing the opening of the school to March 16 and conducting the two-week class remotely since then. They are also urging faculty members to refrain from holding meetings.


How are we going to behave in this situation? First, you should wear a mask when you go out, not just for me, but for others. Although the mask does not completely block coronavirus particles, it is important to prevent saliva, the main infection medium.


Also, wash your hands with soap for more than 30 seconds in running water when you come back from going out. This is because there is a risk of a droplet infection that can become infected when touching eyes, nose and mouth after touching the droplet that contains virus on objects with your hands.


The emergence of unexpected variables has caused many Koreans to worry about the rapid spread of corona. As it is a difficult time, we should refrain from discriminating against people in the same community or trying to profit by using the situation.


If we wait while caring for each other and observing National Action Rules, we will minimize damage and overcome it as we have done before.