How Do Patients Recover From A Deadly Disease Like The Coronavirus?

How Do Patients Recover From A Deadly Disease Like The Coronavirus?

At this time, the number of people infected with the coronavirus in the whole world has increased to more than 2.4 million. About one lakh 67 thousand people have lost their lives due to this dangerous disease. Meanwhile, to defeat the coronavirus, scientists from all over the world are looking for a cure or vaccine. Do you know how the coronavirus affects a person's body and how people recover from this dangerous disease?

The coronavirus enters the body via the nose or mouth and lives in the air sac inside the lungs. The virus carries the cells in the air sac and grows until the cell dies, after which the virus spreads and starts attacking the surrounding cells.

Then the immune system starts its work. This includes cells, protein cells, and antibodies. It may take a few days or a week for this disease resistance to emerge inside the body. The symptoms of mild cough, cold, fever, headache are not due to any virus but are part of the resistance of our body that we get from birth. It helps in taking out bacteria through sputum. Fever creates an environment to prevent the virus from growing in the body.

However, in severe cases, lung inflammation can also lead to a cytokine storm, which means that the respiratory disease becomes more severe. A cytokine storm is the result of the immune system causing hyper-inflammation and causing more harm than it can help the body.

If the air sac becomes weak, then the patient needs a ventilator to breathe. In severe cases, the patient may also suffer from the systemic inflammatory syndrome, which can result in septic shock and multiple organ failure. This is the reason why all patients of the coronavirus are dying.

Mild to moderate infections are seen in 80–85 percent of coronavirus patients, but severe symptoms are seen in 15–20 percent of people. Experts believe that it can take from 6 weeks to a month in severe cases to fully recover from the coronavirus.

In most cases, only mild symptoms are seen. In this, people feel symptoms like tiredness, cough, muscle aches, fever, and chest discomfort. Such patients recover in two weeks, as does the common flu. On appearing mild symptoms, the patient may remain in self-isolation and recover at home.

Shortness of breath with mild symptoms is a sign of moderate symptoms. In such a situation, the patient has to be hospitalized for a few days. Even oxygen may be required. Some patients also experience symptoms such as high fever or diarrhea, due to which they need IV fluids.

In severe cases, the patient develops Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS), due to which water in the lungs starts filling up and it becomes difficult to breathe. They usually require a ventilator for at least two weeks.

Older people or people who already have a serious illness such as cancer or heart disease are difficult to recover from ARDS because their immune system is very weak. Nearly 60 percent of those who died this month were over 60 years of age. However, this does not mean that young people can overcome ARDS.

After ARDS, it is not easy for anyone to escape. If the ARDS is caused by a car accident compared to infection, then the human is more likely to recover. Patients who are removed from the ventilator experience weight loss, weakness, and in many cases post-traumatic stress disorder.

- Amit Choudhary

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