SARS COV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19, belongs to a wider family of zoonotic (can spread from animals to humans) viruses called corona viruses. This family is responsible for causing other respiratory diseases such as the common cold. As such, there are comparisons between COVID-19 and the common cold. The main thing to note, however, is that while the flu has been studied for decades due to it being around for that long, COVID-19 is a very new disease and thus information about it is limited, with new data coming up every day.
Both of these diseases attack the respiratory system but while the flu is seasonal, COVID-19 has yet to be established as a seasonal disease. Moreover, while flu has an average reproduction rate of 1.3, that of COVID-19 is about twice as that, meaning that a single patient of COVID-19 can infect two or three other people.
According to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC, flu symptoms include: fever, sore throat, cough, runny or stuffy nose, body aches, headaches and fatigue. Vomiting and diarrhoea may sometimes be experienced, although this is more prevalent in children than in adults. As for COVID-19, the most common symptoms as reported by the WHO are fever, tiredness and dry cough. Others which do not manifest in all patients include body aches, nasal congestion, runny nose, diarrhoea and nasal congestion. Other people are asymptomatic and do not show these symptoms, but may still be infectious.
Flu is mostly spread from one person to another via droplets, and can spread between people at a distance of six feet apart. This is the same distance medical professionals encourage to be kept during social distancing, to reduce the spread of COVID-19. For both of these diseases, person to person transmission occurs whereby droplets from an infected person land in the mouths or noses of healthy persons, or are inhaled into the lungs. These droplets may be produced during coughing or sneezing, which is why it is advisable to cough into the upper sleeve, or into a disposable tissue and disinfect hands after in order to reduce transmission.
On the other hand, while flu transmission by coming into contact with surfaces or objects that have the virus occur much less often, recent study from the National Institutes of health and Princeton University Scientists indicate that the SARS COV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-2, is stable for several hours and even days on surfaces. For instance, the virus was detected in aerosols for up to three hours, on copper up to four hours and on cardboard up to 24 hours. Further, on plastic and on stainless steel, the virus was found to be stable for up to two to three days.
When we consider the death rates of the two diseases, that of flu is considerably lower, with death tolls of patients at 0.1%. For COVID-19, a lot of factors affecting the death toll are yet to be exhaustively studied, including the quality of healthcare and underlying health conditions. Even so, the average death toll is about 2%.
According to scientists, however, the danger of COVID-19 isn’t so much in the death toll as in the overpopulation of health facilities which is likely to occur if the spread of the disease continues. This would mean ineffective treatment of patients due to inadequate resources, and poor ventilation. So wash your hands with soap and water as much as possible, cough into the upper sleeve and maintain a social distance of six feet.
