Originally Posted by
Peter H
Thanks to all who replied about cytokine storms.
I asked because I vaguely remember a SARS related article that talked about the use drugs to dampen this misplaced immune response.
In particular the
repurposing of already-approved off-the-shelf drugs. Although I've seen mention of -- often new -- anti-virals I've not seen
mention of anti-immune-response ones. (Maybe because it's so old-hat that it's not worth mentioning.)
PS Re the query about the origin of the virus, I've seen suggestions that the virus may have originated in bats (cf Elboa?).
As a thread search for
bats was unsuccessful, here's a quickly-chosen ref:
https://www.businessinsider.com/wuha...20-1?r=US&IR=T
For more than you want to know, see Flutrackers.com. It provides links to most aspects of the outbreak, including links to the health measures attempted as well as the virus research.
The virus is very transmissible, as evidenced by a case in China where 2 families were infected in a restaurant simply by sitting next to a third family which had an asymptomatic but infected member.
If China does not manage to control this outbreak despite measures akin to martial law, a pandemic is probable, because society in other countries is less rigorously controlled.