What I think, watch, listen to, and eat each week
The thoughts and words that I want to share
No, I don’t need to be tested to look for SARS-COV-2 (which is the virus which causes COVID-19). I did have to see my GP though last week. Someone asked, are you going to get tests from the doctor? It’s amusing to me when someone assumes primary health care practitioners do the testing.
This is not a post about the policy decision to encourage social distancing. I just want to offer another way of thinking of a form of words.
There may be some confusion about the words quarantine and isolation. Last week, I wrote about the confusion some people have about the name of an infectious disease and the name of the microorganism that causes it.
What’s in a name (or two)? The virus formerly known as 2019-nCoV and the disease formerly known as 2019-nCoV infection.
Changes in names of microorganisms can be frustrating for non-health people as well as healthcare practitioners. Not least for ageing pathologists and medical laboratory scientists (me) who also struggle to keep up to date. The names of organisms and the diseases caused are important. It’s important we get the names correct and we use the names correctly so we have clarity when communicating about microorganisms and infectious diseases.
The virus formerly known as 2019-nCoV has been named by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV). The ICTV designated the virus as Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-COV-2) and it sits in the species Severe acute respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus alongside SARS-COV. The species sits within the Genus: Betacoronavirus.
The World Health Organization has designated the disease caused by SARS-COV-2 as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19).
Getting the distinction correct between the cause or ætiological agent and the disease or syndrome or manifestation or condition is important. It’s frustrating to read experts refer to diseases by using microorganism names and vice versa. I find it odd when looking at a list titled something like “Important agents of concern” and see anthrax listed rather than Bacillus anthracis or in a list titled something like “Important diseases of concern” to see Listeria rather than listeriosis.
As you can tell I am a pedantic old fart.
