The New York Times
What Does the Coronavirus Do to the Body?

As cases of coronavirus infection proliferate around the world and governments take extraordinary measures to limit the spread, there is still a lot of confusion about what exactly the virus does to people’s bodies.
The symptoms — fever, cough, shortness of breath — can signal any number of illnesses, from flu to strep to the common cold. Here is what medical experts and researchers have learned so far about the progression of the infection caused by this new coronavirus — and what they still don’t know.

How does this coronavirus cause infection?

The virus is spread through droplets transmitted into the air from coughing or sneezing, which people nearby can take in through their nose, mouth or eyes. The viral particles in these droplets travel quickly to the back of your nasal passages and to the mucous membranes in the back of your throat, attaching to a particular receptor in cells, beginning there.
Coronavirus particles have spiked proteins sticking out from their surfaces, and these spikes hook onto cell membranes, allowing the virus’ genetic material to enter the human cell.
That genetic material proceeds to “hijack the metabolism of the cell and say, in effect, ‘Don’t do your usual job. Your job now is to help me multiply and make the virus,’” said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee.

How does that process cause respiratory problems?

As copies of the virus multiply, they burst out and infect neighboring cells. The symptoms often start in the back of the throat with a sore throat and a dry cough.
The virus then “crawls progressively down the bronchial tubes,” Schaffner said. When the virus reaches the lungs, their mucous membranes become inflamed. That can damage the alveoli or lung sacs, and they have to work harder to carry out their function of supplying oxygen to the blood that circulates throughout our body and removing carbon dioxide from the blood so that it can be exhaled.
“If you get swelling there, it makes it that much more difficult for oxygen to swim across the mucous membrane,” said Dr. Amy Compton-Phillips, the chief clinical officer for the Providence Health System, which included the hospital in Everett, Washington, that had the first reported case of the coronavirus in the United States, in January.
The swelling and the impaired flow of oxygen can cause those areas in the lungs to fill with fluid, pus and dead cells. Pneumonia, an infection in the lung, can occur.
Some people have so much trouble breathing, they need to be put on a ventilator. In the worst cases, known as Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome, the lungs fill with so much fluid that no amount of breathing support can help, and the patient dies.
What trajectory does the virus take in the lungs?
Dr. Shu-Yuan Xiao, a professor of pathology at the University of Chicago School of Medicine, has examined pathology reports on coronavirus patients in China. He said the virus appears to start in peripheral areas on both sides of the lung and can take a while to reach the upper respiratory tract, the trachea and other central airways.
Xiao, who also serves as the director of the Center For Pathology and Molecular Diagnostics at Wuhan University, said that pattern helps explain why in Wuhan, where the outbreak began, many of the earliest cases were not identified immediately.
The initial testing regimen in many Chinese hospitals did not always detect infection in the peripheral lungs, so some people with symptoms were sent home without treatment.
“They’d either go to other hospitals to seek treatment or stay home and infect their family,” he said. “That’s one of the reasons there was such a wide spread.”
A recent study from a team led by researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York found that more than half of 121 patients in China had normal CT scans early in their disease. That study and work by Xiao show that as the disease progresses, CT scans show “ground glass opacities,” a kind of hazy veil in parts of the lung that are evident in many types of viral respiratory infections. Those opaque areas can scatter and thicken in places as the illness worsens, creating what radiologists call a “crazy paving” pattern on the scan.
Are the lungs the only part of the body affected?
Not necessarily. Compton-Phillips said the infection can spread through the mucous membranes, from the nose down to the rectum.
So while the virus appears to zero in on the lungs, it may also be able to infect cells in the gastrointestinal system, experts say. This may be why some patients have symptoms like diarrhea or indigestion. The virus can also get into the bloodstream, Schaffner said.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that RNA from the new coronavirus has been detected in blood and stool specimens, but that it’s unclear whether infectious virus can persist in blood or stool.
Bone marrow and organs like the liver can become inflamed too, said Dr. George Diaz, section leader for infectious diseases at Providence Regional Medical Center in Everett, Washington, whose team treated the first U.S. coronavirus patient. There may also be some inflammation in small blood vessels, as happened with SARS, the viral outbreak in 2002 and 2003.
“The virus will actually land on organs like the heart, the kidney, the liver, and may cause some direct damage to those organs,” Schaffner said. As the body’s immune system shifts into high gear to battle the infection, the resulting inflammation may cause those organs to malfunction, he said.
As a result, some patients may endure damage that is inflicted not just by the virus but by their own immune system as it rages to combat the infection.
Experts have not yet documented whether the virus can affect the brain. But scientists who studied SARS have reported some evidence that the SARS virus could infiltrate the brain in some patients. Given the similarity between SARS and COVID-19, the infection caused by the new coronavirus, a paper published last month in the Journal of Medical Virology argued that the possibility that the new coronavirus might be able to infect some nerve cells should not be ruled out.
Why do some people get very ill but most don’t?
About 80% of people infected with the new coronavirus have relatively mild symptoms. But about 20% of people become more seriously ill; and in about 2% of patients in China, which has had the most cases, the disease has been fatal.
Experts say the effects appear to depend on how robust or weakened a person’s immune system is. Older people or those with underlying health issues, like diabetes or another chronic illness, are more likely to develop severe symptoms.
Xiao conducted pathological examinations of two people in China who went into a hospital in Wuhan in January for a different reason — they needed surgery for early-stage lung cancer — but whose records later showed that they had also had coronavirus infection, which the hospital did not recognize at the time. Neither patient’s lung cancer was advanced enough to kill them, he said.
One of those patients, an 84-year-old woman with diabetes, died from pneumonia caused by coronavirus, Xiao said the records showed.
The other patient, a 73-year-old man, was somewhat healthier, with a history of hypertension that he had managed well for 20 years. Xiao said the man had successful surgery to remove a lung tumor, was discharged, and nine days later returned to the hospital because he had a fever and cough that was determined to be the coronavirus.
Xiao said that the man had almost certainly been infected during his first stay in the hospital, since other patients in his post-surgical recovery room were later found to have the coronavirus. Like many other cases, it took the man days to show respiratory symptoms.
The man recovered after 20 days in the hospital’s infectious disease unit. Experts say that when patients like that recover, it is often because the supportive care — fluids, breathing support and other treatment — allows them to outlast the worst effects of the inflammation caused by the virus.

What do scientists still not know about coronavirus patients?

A lot. Although the illness resembles SARS in many respects and has elements in common with influenza and pneumonia, the course a patient’s coronavirus will take is not yet fully understood.
Some patients can remain stable for over a week and then suddenly develop pneumonia, Diaz said. Some patients seem to recover but then develop symptoms again.
Xiao said that some patients in China recovered but got sick again, apparently because they had damaged and vulnerable lung tissue that was subsequently attacked by bacteria in their body. Some of those patients ended up dying from a bacterial infection, not the virus. But that didn’t appear to cause the majority of deaths, he said.
Other cases have been tragic mysteries. Xiao said he personally knew a man and woman who got infected but seemed to be improving. Then the man deteriorated and was hospitalized.
“He was in ICU, getting oxygen, and he texted his wife that he was getting better, he had good appetite and so on,” Xiao said. “But then in the late afternoon, she stopped receiving texts from him. She didn’t know what was going on. And by 10 p.m., she got a notice from the hospital that he had passed.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

© 2020 The New York Times Company

Coronavirus: News and live updates
Yahoo News Staff
,Yahoo News•March 13, 2020

The latest on the pandemic:

• President Trump declared a national emergency over the coronavirus in order to free up $50 billion in federal aid.

• Trump said he will "most likely" be tested for the novel disease.

• U.S. stocks rebounded by nearly 2,000 points, or more than 9 percent, a day after suffering the largest percentage drop since 1987.
• Deaths from coronavirus have now topped 5,000, with more than 132,000 cases worldwide. Europe has been declared the epicenter.

• Testing in the U.S. continues to be slow, with less than 100 tests performed nationwide this week, according to the CDC.

• Louisiana has postponed its presidential primary; Ohio, Michigan and Maryland have all closed K-12 schools.

• Multiple sports events were canceled or postponed including the Boston Marathon, the NCAA basketball tournament, and the Masters.

Meanwhile Prince Charles and his wife Camilla have cancelled an upcoming tour of Bosnia, Cyprus and Jordan on British government advice, a spokesman for the royal couple said on Thursday.

a spokesman said.

This isn't the first measures that have been taken to protect Queen Elizabeth from the deadly virus; last week at an investiture at Buckingham Palace - where she hands out honours such as MBEs - the monarch was photographed wearing gloves, which is not something she typically does.

Princess Charlotte and Prince George Aren’t Allowed to Have Best Friends at School
Starr Bowenbank
CosmopolitanMarch 16, 2020

Photo credit: AARON CHOWN - Getty Images

From Cosmopolitan

    Princess Charlotte and Prince George are discouraged from having best friends at their school.

    This rule exists for all students so nobody in Charlotte and George’s school feels left out.

There are a ton of rules that come with being a royal in the world, and TBH, that list of rules doubles in size when it comes to the British monarchy specifically. Case in point: One of the many rules Princess Charlotte and Prince George have to follow at school is they are not allowed to have a best friend in their class, although the reason isn’t as saddening as it sounds!

Charlotte and George go to Thomas’s Battersea, where there is a rule that says students are unable to selectively invite their classmates to parties that they hold outside of school. This is not in an effort to be strict—it’s more to encourage and teach the students to be kind and thoughtful toward all their peers.

“It’s a really great little school actually for the reasons I think that it really focuses on kindness, it’s a really big thing in that school and the pastoral care is amazing,” British journalist Jane Moore said on Loose Women, according to The Mirror. “There’s a policy that if your child is having a party, unless every child in the class is invited, you don’t give out the invites in class, which I think is quite a good thing as you don’t feel excluded.”

In addition to the party rule, Charlotte and George’s school discourages the concept of “best friends” and tries instead to emphasize the inclusion of everyone. “There are signs everywhere saying be kind, that’s the ethos of the school,” she added. “They don’t encourage you to have best friends.” Okay, that does make sense.

BRB, wishing this rule applied to everyone in life and not just royal children!

From Cosmopolitan

    Princess Beatrice and Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi will likely have to postpone their wedding, again, because of coronavirus.

    They’re reportedly considering eloping with only two witnesses.

    Their wedding was already postponed because of Prince Andrew’s connection to Jeffrey Epstein.

Princess Beatrice’s wedding with Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi truly is what people are calling “the most cursed engagement in royal history” because after so many delays, it looks like Beatrice and Edoardo will have to limit their huge royal wedding to include only three (3!!!) other people.

Last week, Daily Mail reported that due to coronavirus, Beatrice and Edoardo’s May wedding would include only a “small group of family and friends.” That was before the global pandemic got much worse, and now it’s clear their ceremony will have to be even smaller than that.

These are the new wedding rules according to the Church of England:

    “During the coronavirus outbreak, the number of people attending church weddings should be limited to the legal minimum of five—which consists of the happy couple, the priest, and two witnesses.”

Basically, there’s no way Bea and Ed can have a small gathering for the wedding now. Because of these restrictions, they’ll have to think long and hard about who the two witnesses will be if they actually decide to go through with it.
After these new guidelines circulated, Daily Mail published another report suggesting the couple is considering eloping and planning a huge reception later this year as a compromise. The outlet reported:

    “Friends say restrictions on large gatherings, and the fear of the impact of coronavirus on the older generation, made the decision inevitable. Now the couple are deciding what they will do. Extraordinarily, they are weighing up the possibility of a behind-closed-doors ‘elopement’-style wedding that will feature just five people: the bride, groom, priest, and two witnesses. They would then throw the party to end all parties some months hence, when all is back to normal.”

Damn. Planning this wedding must be a complete nightmare.

Princess Eugenie Beams in a Rare New Photo from Her Wedding Day

For the princess's stunning bridal look, she donned a Peter Pilotto gown, a Greville Emerald Kokoshnik Tiara, and satin Charlotte Olympia peep-toe heels. She kept her makeup fresh and flush, complete with a rosy-pink pout. For the reception, the bride followed up with a champagne-hued Zac Posen gown.

Eugenie also shared a few throwback photos of her own to celebrate her birthday while also thanking royals fans, family, and friends alike for their warm birthday wishes. The mini slideshow included photos of Eugenie as a newborn with her parents, as well as adorable snapshots of the princess as a young toddler.

"Thank you for all the wonderful birthday messages. XX 💋," wrote Eugenie.

It’s been a hard few weeks. COVID-19 is having a real impact on all of us—our plans, our families and friends, our day-to-day lives.

We want to help. Help you find smart ideas for dealing with being at home. Help you cook good food from your freezer or your pantry. Help you teach your kids. Help you set up a makeshift office—or meditate. Whatever you need right now to feel a little better, our community is sharing more ideas than ever:

While we stay inside as much as we can to slow the spread of COVID-19, let’s lift each other with helpful ideas for these times.

Kate Middleton's Self-Isolating Look Involves No Jewelry and the Perfect Blowout

While a lot of the world is self-isolating in pajamas and gym clothes that will never see the glaring fluorescent light of a fitness facility, Kate Middleton is maintaining her perfect blowout and dialing back on her royal bling. According to People, the Kensington Royal Instagram account let followers see what working from home is like for the royals and eagle-eyed fans zeroed in on some key details.

For one, Middleton isn't wearing her engagement ring or her diamond eternity band. Why? Like many things, they've fallen victim to the rules and regulations surrounding the coronavirus. Rings keep people from thoroughly washing their hands, so Kate's setting a good example by keeping her diamond-and-sapphire engagement ring and diamond band out of the spotlight for now. People adds that she was still wearing her Welsh gold wedding band, however, so not everything is put away.

Middleton's at-home look also involved a tailored suit, her signature soft smoky eye, and princess-worthy hair. Of course, things may be different when there aren't cameras around, but it seems like royalty definitely does this whole work-from-home thing a little more dressed up than the rest of the world. In the photos, Kate is wearing a dusty pink suit that she also wore to visit a call center with Prince William. While there are no clear shots of her shoes, here's hoping she skipped out on the heels for a day of royal Zoom calls and snack breaks.

From Marie Claire

    First things first: Queen Elizabeth II, who met with son Prince Charles a couple of weeks before he was diagnosed with the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), remains in great health.

    So much so, in fact, that she's still taking weekly audiences with Prime Minister Boris Johnson—accidentally creating an amazing meme in the process.

    She recently issued a statement about COVID-19, saying, "You can be assured that my family and I stand ready to play our part."

The Queen's a meme! Well, technically, Queen Elizabeth memes were already a thing, but it's a rare thing when the Royal Family basically serves us up a meme template on a silver platter. But that's exactly what happened: The royal family's official Instagram posted a side-by-side image of the Queen and Prime Minister Boris Johnson on the phone, having their weekly call but making sure to practice proper social distancing. (ICYMI, Johnson tested positive for COVID-19, and so did the Queen's son Prince Charles, but the official report is that the Queen's in great health. She's a badass, no biggie.)

After marveling over the old corded phones the two were using (also, check out how many corgi references the Queen has on her desk), fans were absolutely delighted by the potential opportunities. "THANK YOU FOR THIS VERY CLEAR MEME," wrote one. "I can already see the memes 😂👍" laughed another.

Celebrity
Here's what could happen if Prince Harry and Meghan Markle decide to return to the royal family

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry and Queen Elizabeth II.

Getty Images

    Meghan Markle and Prince Harry could change their minds and decide to return to royal duties if Buckingham Palace were to review their situation down the line.

    Insider spoke to royal experts, who explained that the royal family could be leaving the door open for the duke and duchess to return.

    "It may well be that Harry's military links, which he will be sorry to forgo, especially that of Captain General of the Royal Marines, will remain vacant during that time just in case there is a rethink," royal commentator Richard Fitzwilliams told Insider.

    However, Marlene Koenig, a royal expert for History Extra, told Insider that "the media would be without mercy" if the couple were to return.

    Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex officially stepped down from their royal duties on April 1. However, their decision to resign and pursue financial independence will be up for review in just a year's time, according to royal experts.

Although Buckingham Palace has not officially commented on what this means for Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, one possibility is that they could decide to return to royal life after this transitional period.

"Harry and Meghan's choice of independence seems completely clear at the moment," Richard Fitzwilliams, a royal commentator, told Insider.

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry.

"However, no one can predict the future with any certainty and the Queen, having released a statement after the Sandringham Summit confirming that they will not use their royal titles and will step down from royal duties but remain members of the royal family, wisely allowed for a reassessment of the situation after a year."

The couple and their son, Archie, have moved to LA after spending time in Canada. It was recently reported that staff at their Frogmore Cottage base in the UK have been relocated.

Insider spoke to royal experts about the possibility that Harry and Markle could one day step back into their senior roles.

While royal experts don't think it's likely, they say the royal family could leave the door open for Harry and Meghan to return

When Prince Harry gave up his royal duties, he also gave up his military titles. Fitzwilliams argues that these may be left vacant in case the duke changes his mind before the review.

Princes Harry and William.

Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images

"It may well be that Harry's military links, which he will be sorry to forgo, especially that of Captain General of the Royal Marines, will remain vacant during that time just in case there is a rethink," Fitzwilliams said.

"Since — apart from Harry's role as Commonwealth Youth Ambassador — they will keep their patronages, were they to reassess their priorities, this could in theory be accommodated."

However, Fitzwilliams added that "this would appear at the moment to be highly unlikely."

"I think Meghan found her voice being muted as a working royal so now she will have more opportunity to do good on hers and Harry's terms," Koenig said.
However, the British press wouldn't be as forgiving

Koenig added that if the couple changed their minds, "the royal family would certainly welcome them back with open arms."

"But the media would be without mercy," she said. "I would expect comments about tails between their legs."

The Queen and Meghan Markle at their first engagement together.

Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

The couple have been locked in a battle with the British press since before Markle even married into the family. In 2016, Harry issued a statement condemning "the smear on the front page of a national newspaper; the racial undertones of comment pieces; and the outright sexism and racism of social media trolls and web article comments."

The royal family's relationship with the press may have been one of the couple's deciding factors leading them to resign this year.

The duke and duchess announced on their Sussex Royal website that they would no longer partake in the "royal rota," a system that allows a rotation of British newspapers and tabloids to attend their engagements.

The couple wrote on their site that they "believe in a free, strong and open media industry, which upholds accuracy and fosters inclusivity, diversity, and tolerance."

Kerry Daynes, a consultant forensic psychologist who often appears in the media, previously told Insider that she has been asked questions designed to achieve a negative and misleading response about Markle.

"I have been asked (by British, more right-wing media) to comment on Harry and Meghan in my capacity as an expert in coercive control," Daynes told Insider.

"I have been asked leading questions along the lines of, 'Can you confirm that isolating someone from their family is a tactic used by controlling partners?'"

Not to mention, Markle launched a lawsuit against the Mail on Sunday after it published a letter she sent to her estranged father last year.

This could further prove the couple's resolution to cut ties with their royal duties.

However, as Fitzwilliams said, "no one can predict the future with any certainty," and Harry and Markle may one day decide to step back into their former roles.

Perhaps this would seem more probable if the Queen were to change the royal family's media guidelines. Although this may seem unlikely (after all, the royal rota has been running successfully for more than 40 years) it's not impossible.

For the first time, Her Majesty publicly acknowledged the brutal press treatment the couple have received in a rare statement made when they resigned.

"I recognize the challenges they have experienced as a result of intense scrutiny over the last two years and support their wish for a more independent life," she said.

Therefore, while there would likely have to be this essential factor in place before the duke and duchess considered returning to their roles, there's nothing to say it couldn't happen.