COVID-19 a Reminder of the Challenge of Emerging Infectious Diseases | NIH: National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases

COVID-19 a Reminder of the Challenge of Emerging Infectious Diseases | NIH: National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases

COVID-19 a Reminder of the Challenge of Emerging Infectious Diseases

February 28, 2020

This transmission electron microscope image shows SARS-CoV-2—also known as 2019-nCoV, the virus that causes COVID-19—isolated from a patient in the U.S. Virus particles are shown emerging from the surface of cells cultured in the lab. The spikes on the outer edge of the virus particles give coronaviruses their name, crown-like.

Credit: NIAID-RML

The emergence and rapid increase in cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a respiratory illness caused by a novel coronavirus, pose complex challenges to the global public health, research and medical communities, write federal scientists from NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Their commentary appears in The New England Journal of Medicine.