Winter Is Coming: A Southern Hemisphere Perspective of the Environmental Drivers of SARS-CoV-2 and the Potential Seasonality of COVID-19.

ABSTRACT: SARS-CoV-2 virus infections in humans were first reported in December 2019, the boreal winter. The resulting COVID-19 pandemic was declared by the WHO in March 2020. By July 2020, COVID-19 was present in 213 countries and territories, with over 12 million confirmed cases and over half a million attributed deaths. Knowledge of other viral respiratory diseases suggests that the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 could be modulated by seasonally varying environmental factors such as temperature and humidity. Many studies on the environmental sensitivity of COVID-19 are appearing online, and some have been published in peer-reviewed journals. Initially, these studies raised the hypothesis that climatic conditions would subdue the viral transmission rate in places entering the boreal summer, and that s

SUBMITTER: Smit AJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7459895 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature