Coronavirus ‘zombies’ roaming Britain for weeks before deadly symptoms emerge, warn experts
BRITAIN could be swarming with "zombies" infected by the deadly coronavirus infection without even knowing it, experts have warned.
The virus has a long incubation time and virtually the same symptoms as the flu, so the full scale of an outbreak in the UK won't be known for weeks.
Professor Robert Dingwall, a public health expert at Nottingham Trent University, told The Sun Online it would impossible to know just how many people could be infected by the killer virus for two weeks.
The epidemic has already claimed the lives of 26 people, and Professor Dingwall has warned that the 14 suspected cases in the UK might be just the tip of the iceberg.
He said: "The problem at the moment is determining how bad the Wuhan coronavirus really is".
The lag time for being infected and getting early symptoms of the disease could be anywhere between four days to two weeks.
That means people getting off the plane in the UK could have been infected without knowing it for weeks to come.
Flights from the Wuhan and the surrounding area, where the epidemic started, were landing in Britain as late as Wednesday night.
"Screening everyone on the incoming flights would only have picked up people who were feverish when they boarded or became feverish on the flight" Professor Dingwall said.
This might only pick up 20 per cent of the infected patients, the rest were allowed to enter the UK without any checks from doctors.
He said: "The early stages of the infection are pretty much indistinguishable from seasonal influenza".
Brits currently in the middle of flu season could be carrying the virus which can eventually lead to kidney failure and pneumonia without even knowing it.
What are the symptoms?
- a runny nose
- headache
- cough
- fever
- shortness of breath
- chills
- body ache
More than 41 million people and at least 14 cities are in lockdown as China struggles to deal with the outbreak of the virus.
Professor Dingwall said coronavirus does not appear to be as deadly or as contagious as SARS or MERS, two infections which brought Asian and Middle Eastern cities to a standstill through the epidemics.
But he warned that a major mutation could propel the virus into the epidemic sphere.
And he cautioned milder viruses, are more likely to mutate.
He said: "Mutations tend to favour milder rather than more severe infections."
Days after the initial outbreak in Wuhan, cases of the virus spread to Thailand, South Korea, Taiwain and Japan.
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