ABSTRACT
The world is grappling with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the causative agent of which is severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). COVID-19 symptoms are similar to the common cold, including fever, sore throat, cough, muscle and chest pain, brain fog, dyspnoea, anosmia, ageusia, and headache. The manifestation of the disease can vary from being asymptomatic to severe life-threatening conditions warranting hospitalization and ventilation support. Furthermore, the emergence of mutecated variants of concern (VOCs) is paramount to the devastating effect of the pandemic. This highly contagious virus and its emergent variants challenge the available advanced viral diagnostic methods for high-accuracy testing with faster result yields. This review is to shed light on the natural history, pathology, molecular biology, and efficient diagnostic methods of COVID-19, detecting SARS-CoV-2 in collected samples. We reviewed the gold standard RT-qPCR method for COVID-19 diagnosis to confer a better understanding and application to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. This comprehensive review may further develop awareness about the management of the COVID-19 pandemic.
ABSTRACT
The world is grappling with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the causative agent of which is severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). COVID-19 symptoms are similar to the common cold, including fever, sore throat, cough, muscle and chest pain, brain fog, dyspnoea, anosmia, ageusia, and headache. The manifestation of the disease can vary from being asymptomatic to severe life-threatening conditions warranting hospitalization and ventilation support. Furthermore, the emergence of mutecated variants of concern (VOCs) is paramount to the devastating effect of the pandemic. This highly contagious virus and its emergent variants challenge the available advanced viral diagnostic methods for high-accuracy testing with faster result yields. This review is to shed light on the natural history, pathology, molecular biology, and efficient diagnostic methods of COVID-19, detecting SARS-CoV-2 in collected samples. We reviewed the gold standard RT-qPCR method for COVID-19 diagnosis to confer a better understanding and application to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. This comprehensive review may further develop awareness about the management of the COVID-19 pandemic.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Although past research has focused on COVID-19-related frames in the news media, such research may not accurately capture and represent the perspectives of people from diverse backgrounds. Additionally, research on the public attention to COVID-19 as reflected through frames on social media is scarce. OBJECTIVE: This study identified the frames about the COVID-19 pandemic in the public discourse on Twitter, which voices diverse opinions. This study also investigated the amount of public attention to those frames on Twitter. METHODS: We collected 22 trending hashtags related to COVID-19 in the United States and 694,582 tweets written in English containing these hashtags in March 2020 and analyzed them via thematic analysis. Public attention to these frames was measured by evaluating the amount of public engagement with frames and public adoption of those frames. RESULTS: We identified 9 frames including "public health guidelines," "quarantine life," "solidarity," "evidence and facts," "call for action," "politics," "post-pandemic life," "shortage panic," and "conflict." Results showed that some frames such as "call for action" are more appealing than others during a global pandemic, receiving greater public adoption and engagement. The "call for action" frame had the highest engagement score, followed by "conflict" and "evidence and facts." Additionally, "post-pandemic life" had the highest adoption score, followed by "call for action" and "shortage panic." The findings indicated that the frequency of a frame on social media does not necessarily mean greater public adoption of or engagement with the frame. CONCLUSIONS: This study contributes to framing theory and research by demonstrating how trending hashtags can be used as new user-generated data to identify frames on social media. This study concludes that the identified frames such as "quarantine life" and "conflict" and themes such as "isolation" and "toilet paper panic" represent the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. The consequences could be (1) exclusively related to COVID-19, such as hand hygiene or isolation; (2) related to any health crisis such as social support of vulnerable groups; and (3) generic that are irrespective of COVID-19, such as homeschooling or remote working.