Day by day, new research reveals more information about the COVID-19 coronavirus and its effects on the human body. The Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) reports on two studies that appeared in The Lancet Infectious Diseases:
“A team from Wuhan, China, reports that even asymptomatic patients with COVID-19 pneumonia have abnormal lung findings on computed tomography (CT), and a group from Beijing noted that viral loads from infected patients appear to peak 5 to 6 days after symptom onset.
The authors of the first study described chest CT findings from 42 men and 39 women admitted to one of two hospitals in Wuhan from December 20, 2019, to January 23, 2020, with COVID-19 pneumonia. All patients (mean age, 49.5 years) had a wide range of abnormal lung changes that spread rapidly from focused areas of excess fluid in one lung to diffuse buildup in both lungs.
Different radiolographic patterns emerged at different points of the disease. The mean number of affected lung segments was 10.5: 2.8 in group 1, 11.1 in group 2, 13.0 in group 3, and 12.1 in group 4. The right lower lobe of the lung had a slight tendency toward involvement.
Read the full story from CIDRAP.
