SCIO briefing on the science-based treatment of severe COVID-19 cases

The State Council Information Office held a press conference Monday afternoon in Wuhan, central China's Hubei province, to brief the media and answer questions concerning the science-based treatment of severe COVID-19 cases.

China.org.cn March 21, 2020

Press Trust of India:

Thank you. First of all, let me compliment the doctors, not simply those who are here, but hundreds of their colleagues who went to this epicenter and tried to confront this virus or the vicious virus head-on. Definitely, today as the virus winds down as well as the figures in Wuhan and probably in Hubei and the rest of China, the question being asked is, will there be a relapse? Will there be a second wave that can come up at a later stage or anytime soon here, because it's happening all over the world now. Secondly, there is not much data that has come out about the virus' impact on children. Now that there is debate about when the schools should be reopened, not simply here, but as well in places where this virus is popping up perhaps. What exactly is or are you rather reading about this virus' impact on children of different ages? Thank you. 

Du Bin:

I'll ask my colleague, Dr. Cao Wei, to answer the question about the relapse. And I'll take the question about the children. 

Cao Wei:

Thank you. I will take the first question. We all know that the status of pandemic has been declared by the WHO a few days ago, which means that the situation of the epidemic globally will not be solely dependent on the situations in China or any other single area or country in the world. Currently, after three months of fights, the outbreak in China, which started in December of last year, has almost come to an end. 

I think we will still wait for another month to see and make a final judgment. But for me, a second domestic outbreak in China wouldn't be a great concern under such measures of prevention and control. But we all know that another important source of newly onset cases now comes from the imported patients from outside China. So it is most probable that the newly reported cases, including the imported ones, may be kept at a relatively low level, but may last for a certain period of time. Thank you. 

Du Bin:

Okay. The second question is concerning COVID-19 in children. Actually, from my observation and discussion with the pediatricians, we know that there are some children that contracted COVID-19. However, the majority of them are doing quite well. There are actually three recent publications, one in JAMA describing nine infants, all under the age of one year old. The other one is about six children, with ages ranging from two to seven years old. Among all these 15 children, only one was admitted to the intensive care unit requiring some sort of supportive therapy, including oxygen therapy; however, all children survived. 

Another paper just published earlier today in Nature Medicine described that, among all the close contacts, the adults have a higher likelihood -- about 2.7 times -- of contracting COVID-19 than children. We currently don't know what the rationale is behind this phenomenon, but we do understand that -- despite the fact they got infected -- the majority of children exhibited a mild disease course, and all of them recovered. According to my understanding, this is what is happening in Wuhan, Hubei, and other provinces. Thank you. 

Xi Yanchun:

Ok, next question, please. The gentleman in the right area in the 3rd row in the suit.

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