Expert has live link with Chinese abroad

Zhang Wenhong, a leading infectious diseases expert at Huashan Hospital and head of a Shanghai medical team fighting the virus, said on Monday that all 17 coronavirus patients from other countries in Shanghai are now in good condition.

He was taking part in a live link for local medical experts to share their experiences with overseas Chinese in Italy, France, Malaysia, Australia and the United Arab Emirates.

Zhang said only one of the 17 was in a more serious condition than the others and this patient's condition was under control.

"Now we clearly know that the novel coronavirus is different from SARS in 2003 and being infected with the virus may not show severe results quickly. The majority of patients can get good results after early treatment," Zhang said.

But he added that there are still 20 percent of patients whose condition is more serious and needed to be sent to hospital soon.

So he thought a key issue in the treatment is the allocation of medical supplies at hospitals in different regions.

"The basic treatment of the disease is oxygen uptake. The 20 percent may get better just with simple treatments at hospitals. If they lose the chance of being treated in hospital, they may have a higher possibility of dying from the disease," he said.

He said isolation at home was important because one of the disease's characteristics is that it has strong transmissibility among family members.

"Infection in the family is the most common way of its spreading. So, I suggest that when anyone in your family shows symptoms, he or she should be isolated at home," said Zhang. "Those living overseas may have a larger space at home and the separation of these people from their family members is important to cut the disease's spreading in families, as well as self-prevention.” Those aged above 65 should be more careful because they are the major group easily attacked by the virus.

It's good to see the epidemic can be controlled at an early stage wherever we are, he said. If the number of patients cannot be restricted in a certain range, it will be a great burden on medical supplies at a later stage.

Zhang said he didn’t expect that this round of coronavirus epidemic will end in the short term. It's impractical for people to suspend their work for long periods, which will affect the economic growth, and they should be ready to work while battling the disease, he said.

Asked by a Chinese in Rome about the serious condition in Italy, Zhang said enhancing the management and construction of quarantine sites should be a good solution. "When there are increasing patients, it's a must to improve the treatment in quarantine sites, or the number of patients, especially the critical ones, will keep rising."

To distinguish those with a light disease from those with a serious one, the best way is doing a computerized tomography (CT) scan, he said.

A question from Sydney in Australia raised the problem of people in some countries not being in the habit of wearing a face mask. Zhang said that though it was a personal choice, there was a risk of increasing the number of cases if people didn’t wear masks in public areas. So he suggested that if people go to a crowded place, it's better to wear a mask.