The reveal of the first Corona-cases in Germany about the Virus

At the end of January Webasto operation, the first well-known Corona appeared at the Munich-based auto supplier cases in Germany. The media attention was huge, showed that the strains from China had managed for the first Time been shown to jump to Germany. A Chinese business travellers, self-infected, had passed on the pathogen unknowingly at Meetings. In the result, 16 people with Sars-CoV-2 were infected.

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The authorities reacted quickly, they isolated the Infected and sent to the contact persons in quarantine. The outbreak came to a Standstill, and also for the persons Concerned, the action ended up off the hook: they were for the most suffering only mild and recovered from the infection.

In retrospect, proves to be the outbreak as a stroke of luck for the research. The so-called “Webasto-Cluster” is also referred to as “the Munich cohort” and allowed detailed insights in the way how the new pathogen could spread. In the journal “The Lancet Infectious Diseases” scientists have now published an analysis of the 16 Covid-19-cases and 241 contact persons. The data provide insights to a number of questions: In what Ways does the pathogen appears to spread particularly well? Which contacts the risk of contagion is particularly high?

The Chinese business woman is referred to in the study as a Patient 0* – of your the infection was done. During your stay in Munich, they suffered a first non-specific symptoms, including pain in the limbs. Typical Covid-19-symptoms such as coughing developed after their return to China.

In Munich, the woman took on the 20. January on a one-hour Meeting, as the study showed. With three more persons were sitting in the small room. He was about twelve square meters in size.

Patient 1 was sitting next to the business woman from China; two other colleagues were sitting on the opposite side of the table. You were infected with the Coronavirus. Patient 1 had the following day for a brief personal contact with Patient 0. 23. January, the staff developed a sore throat. 27. January learned of Patient 1 of the infection, Patient 0, and tested positive for the Coronavirus.

How Patient 2 infected, it is unclear, he remembers no direct contact with Patient 0. However, the analysis of the virus genome suggests that he must have been in the business wife. Patient 3 has been inserted, apparently, in the case of Patient 1, after the two at 24. January had worked for a short time on the same Computer. The Transfer took place a day after the onset of symptoms (neck pain). Patient 3 was, in turn, Patient 12. The two met on the 25. January – the day of symptom onset in Patient 3, and languages for about an hour and a half long. Later in the evening, the two met in the house of the Patient 3. There is also the Partner of Patient 3, the non-infected with the Coronavirus was.

Another note on the Transmission before symptom onset

Patient 4 was also in the business woman from China, he had contact with her on may 20.21. 22. January. 24. January got Patient 4 chills. It is remarkable, as the Virus of Patient 4 Patient 5 passed. The two had only brief contact in the canteen – Patient 5 borrowed in the case of Patient 4 the salt shaker. Otherwise, the two sat back-to-back. The Meeting occurred two days before in the case of Patient 4 the symptoms started. A pre-symptomatic Transmission was also due to the virus sequence analyses is highly likely, the study authors write. In four cases, the Munich-based cohort, the Transfer probably took place on the day of symptom onset. The other cases are not clearly identified.

Ten of the 16 Covid-19 patients were employees of the automotive supplier, as well as the business woman from China, and their Chinese companions, Patient 13. He flew with Patient 0 back to China and developed on the 27. January Symptoms. Among the 16 Infected four individuals were of the female sex. The mean age was 35 years.

High risk of infection in the household

Patient 5, in turn, also parts of his five-member household infected with the Virus, with the exception of a Person. After the infection, the family was isolated in a hospital room. Three of the four family members of the diseased. The researchers calculated an infection rate (“attack rate”) from 75 per cent in households where a Covid-19-case was in a confined space with other residents isolated. Isolation outside of the budget, the Rate lowered to 10 percent. For contacts outside of the household with a high risk of infection, you will be given with 5 percent.

“Most of the Transfers found within the house and of the other immediate contacts in place,” says Annelies Wilder-Smith, Professor of emerging infectious diseases at the “London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine” with a view on the data. “A close and prolonged contact definitely increases the risk of infection, but a shorter contact – for example, in the case of bus drivers or in grocery stores – does not preclude a Transfer.”

It underlines, therefore, the Use of the mouth, nose and coverings. “The Wearing of masks in Public to reduce the Transmission of pre-symptomatic infections, if people know that they are infected,” says Wilder-Smith. “People with symptoms should not go out in Public, and all measures should be taken to prevent symptomatic people isolated.”

Because the current study: the importance of transmission chains to keep track of and contact people in quarantine were following show.

*The term “Patient” does not allow to draw conclusions on the gender of the persons concerned. This applies to all described in this Text, patients.

Source: “The Lancet Infectious Diseases”