Risk assessment: Outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2): increased transmission beyond China – fourth update

Summary:

On 31 December 2019, a cluster of pneumonia cases of unknown aetiology was reported in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China. On 9 January 2020, China CDC reported a novel coronavirus as the causative agent of this outbreak, which is phylogenetically in the SARS-CoV clade. The novel coronavirus has thus been named ‘severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2’ (SARS-CoV-2), while coronavirus disease associated with it is now referred to as COVID-19. As of 13 February 2020, 9:00, more than 60 330 cases of COVID-19 have been reported worldwide, mainly in China and from all Chinese provinces; of these cases, more than 450 cases were reported from other countries. As of 13 February, 13 countries reported local transmission.

In the EU/EEA and the UK, 44 cases have been reported as of 13 February. Among them, 21 are locally acquired: Germany (14), France (6) and the UK (1). All of these cases have epidemiological links to earlier identified clusters with importations from outside the EU/EEA and the UK.

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