Public Suggestions and Tips

Notes on Covid as a virus diseases. How Covid is transmitted and how to prevent it.

• Covid-19 and Virus Infections
• Sars-CoV-2 Transmission
• How to Reduce Covid-19 Transmissions
• Observing - helps to Detect Infections
• Live Healthily

Covid-19 and Virus Infections

For risk groups, Covid-19 can be serious short-term and such serious infections can damage organs or even be deadly. For people with a good immune system and without risk factors the severity of Covid-19 ranges usually from asymptomatic to moderate illness. For a good recovery it is important to have a healthy lifestyle and giving the infection time to cure. A good recovery includes moderate and situation adapted movement, then longer lasting symptoms such as tiredness or immune system overreactions are unlikely.

Awareness for viruses and knowledge what they do and how they can harm or help is important. No reason to be afraid or panic however, unlike viruses we’ve got a mind, better communication and a superb body police called immune system. The immune system is crucial since avoiding viruses is not possible. Many viruses live temporarily or permanently in our body and form our virome and some literally became part of our DNA. Viruses can be harmful, but mostly the immune system controls and if necessary limits the virus interactions. Viruses helped us evolving and still can do so.

Regarding effects: short-term and long-term, adverse and beneficial, unwanted and wanted effects are known and even proven for many things and behaviors, so its about setting priorities. Ideally we all - if we want - are capable to take own educated decisions on priorities or at least can contributing to decisions.

Trying to contribute to knowledge and explain knowledge on coronaviruses is a major motivation for this page.

The page started in March 2020, experimental in flavour. Content has been added, updated and corrected many times since. Some statements date back long - some went overlooked and some are still valid.

Time to act mindfully, carefully and circumspectly & work together in an open, fair and honest way.

Sars-CoV-2 Transmission

SARS-CoV-2 is mostly transmitted through the air, either by droplets (virions in water droplets flying like balls) or by aerosol (tiny droplets or dust like particulates with virions that move with the air). For Covid-19 aerosol transmission is more frequent and much more dangerous.

Covid transmission paths and prevention:

• Droplet Transmission: Water droplets larger than fly in trajectories similar to balls thrown. How fare they fly depends on the initial movement: when coughing or sneezing they fly farther than when talking. Transmission risk is in situation when bad breath/reek of alcohol is smelled. Droplet can be exchanged when close range face-to-face talking and this gives a transmission opportunity. Prevent
  • Masks
  • Distance
  • Side-a-side instead of face-to-face
  • Plexiglas
• Aerosols Transmission: Aerosols behave soot/dust-like. Aerosol transmission occurs mainly in heated indoor rooms: the cooler outdoors, the drier in heated indoor rooms and the likelier aerosol transmission. Aerosol transmission is hard to completely prevent, but it can be efficiently reduced:
  • being outdoors and when indoors: ventilation, distance and less people
  • masks, preferably with a good fit and filter and changed/cleaned frequently.
  • if possibly infected (e.g. having any kind of respiratory symptoms) staying home and out of foreign indoor rooms

  The smoke-model makes it easier to detect and avoid situations with aerosol transmission: Just smelling smoke is the theoretical possibility of infection. Being that exposed to smoke that the cloth start smelling, likely corresponds to a probability of a few percentages to get infected. A neighbors candle won’t be smelled through doors, but in a place with an indoor barbecue, smoke is smelled in the stairways. For Covid-19 this means: A single neighbor being infected is no risk, but in place with possibly many infected people e.g. a hospital treating Covid-19 patients, wearing a mask in all rooms is important. Also it is important to ventilate regularly especially before opening doors.

A more in depth description is in the section Airborne Transmission

How to Reduce Covid-19 Transmissions

Remark: To reduce transmissions is mostly adequate/needed when Sars-Cov-2 ARDS/SARS disease patterns are high. Coronaviruses are not harmful per se, so when there are no or very few cases of severe Covid, the benefits of reducing transmissions are questionable/unclear. Overall the suggestions below are mainly meant when many get really sick. An early version of the suggestions in March 2020, many updates and corrections have been done since, however the flavour of that unknown situation in 2020 stayed - to keep in mind when reading the notes below. // As of January 2022 the situation is different and SARS-CoV-2 is on the way to become an endemic virus - precautions are mostly needed in sensible situations.

In brief: Aerosol transmission is smoke like. To reduce the infection possibilities keep some distance or wear a mask, prefer fresh air and think ahead.

• Outdoors

  Outdoors with some distance is safe. Ideally, walk or cycle directly from home. outdoors is unconfined settings, face-to-face talking is a transmission opportunity, but severe disease is mostly not transmitted by droplets.

• Ventilate

  Ventilation has been shown to be effective to reduce airborne virus spread.

• No Dry Air

  Dry air increases the transmission for Covid since:

  • In dry air, both dust and particles with viruses stay longer in the air.
  • Viruses survive better in dry air.
  • Dry air increases the chance that a virus infection starts in the lungs, where it is more likely to cause a symptomatic or even severe disease.
  • Dry air reduces the defences of the respiratory tract against pathogens.

  In areas with indoor heating, drying cloths indoors keeps the air humid. Air-conditioning can yield dry air.

• Masks

  Mask in indoor places can reduce transmissions. The longer one stays, the more people there are and the less ventilation there is, the more important. Since transmission increase with the amount of indoor air breathed.

  The mask should have a good fit and a good filter. In some situation high-filtration is important: in hospitals and if one is possible diseased. But if symptomatic staying out of indoor crowds is crucial, since masks just reduce the spread but do not prevent it. The same is true for all other prevention measures such as distancing and hygiene, they reduce but do not prevent spread.

  To protect others, masks ideally are switched frequently (each few hours). Coronaviruses are not stable and after two days waiting, putting into the sunlight or washed with soap/warm water nearly all viruses are decayed). So masks can be reused if cleaned or left unused for 2 days. From time to time it should replaced or washed thoroughly - there’s more than Sars-CoV-2, that’s not to forget!

• Transport

  Ventilation, masks and distance if possible in public transport. Considering, that many people, especially children, will and should go outside right where they live, limited use of cars in cities is polite - it’s nicer and safer with light traffic.

• Distancing

  Distancing reduces infection risk.

• Hygiene

  Keep proper hygiene. Especially wash hands when appropriate. Soap removes most pathogens and even destroys enveloped viruses such as coronaviruses or influenza viruses. Many microbiota, some pathogenic, are transmitted through fomites - worms nearly exclusively, bacteria often by fomites, however RNA viruses not so often but mostly airborne or by direct contact. Diseases can burden by itself and respiratory diseases can be difficult to distinguish from Covid-19.

  But do NOT rely on hygiene alone, since the majority of severe Covid transmissions occur through air.

Observing - helps to Detect Infections

Paying attention to disease symptoms. The more common Covid-19 in a region is, the more likely a respiratory disease is Covid-19.

In South East Switzerland, my place, a day hike away from northern Italy - Covid-19 is/was (as of March 2020) the most prevalent disease.

• Sars-CoV-2 can infect most locations in the respiratory tract except the vocal folds. So most respiratory symptoms can indicate a SARS-CoV-2 infection, a hoarse voice however indicates an other infection.
• The precaution measures against Covid-19 protect against all respiratory diseases, so all respiratory diseases are reduced. Common colds are not common right now. So respiratory symptoms means being careful and even can mean figuring out all the people one could have infected and informing them to watch for symptoms.
• Every morning first smell and then taste your favorite breakfast drink.

• Measure the temperature several times every day and best in the same situations and record the values. An increased temperature can be an early sign of a possible Sars-CoV-2 infection. However many people have only a slight increase, which doesn’t “meet the definition of fever”, see Covid-19 symptoms. Keep in mind that the temperature varies during a day and with the activities performed. That’s why several measurements.

  It’s time [for medicine] to move on from digitalization schemes to a continuous color-space and individuality. There’s no hard border for fever at 37.5 or at 38 degrees.

Live Healthily

A good immune system goes hand in hand with a healthy lifestyle.

For a good immune system it helps to:

• sleep enough, eat healthily, relax and do some sport.

and avoid weakening the immune system:

• avoid being cold or even freezing for a longer period. For this reason, in cold climates, windows shouldn’t be kept open permanently.
• avoid immunosuppressants unless necessary for medical reasons.

  Immunosuppressants are not a major risk factor for Covid though => no reason to be afraid if they are necessary (some carefulness is appropriate however).

• avoid excessive caffeine, excessive sport (if in a very high risk region), excessive alcohol …

  From time to time exceptions - as long as not overly excessive - seem to be not much adverse or even healthy such as in the case of excessive sports, possibly since the immune system and overall body homeostasis gets some training. Recovery time is important however.

• try to reduce stress for oneself and others. Trying too hard won’t help though.

Stress is an important factor, who hasn’t experienced falling sick after a stressful period? It’s about balancing the different kinds of risks and chances we have been and are facing through our entire evolution.