Our unintended new vocabulary
(Editor's Note: This article is intended to help readers understand many of the new phrases used when talking about COVID-19. However, it is not intended as medical advice. If you have questions about your health, please contact your doctor.)
For more than a year, the citizens of Dripping Springs and those of our entire planet have been required to add a new vocabulary to our existing one. Unlike the vocabulary of sports, foreign cuisines or distant cultures, this is a vocabulary we share (in different languages) with our brothers and sisters all over the world.
This terminology we have acquired, unintendedly, is due to the current pandemic. Understanding this new vocabulary and what each term means can help us protect ourselves from infection and lower our anxiety.
How many do you know and understand?
Acute respiratory stress syndrome (ARDS): a condition in which fluid builds up in the air sacs of the lungs. The fluid prohibits the lungs from getting enough air, leading to a deprivation of oxygen in the bloodstream. The condition is often fatal.
Asymptomatic -- Not showing any symptoms (signs of disease or illness). Some people without any symptoms still have and can spread the coronavirus. They’re asymptomatic, but contagious. Fever, cough, and shortness of breath are the main symptoms of COVID-19. Call your healthcare provider or a UVA clinic if you have any of the symptoms.
Case rate: Case fatality rate, or CFR, is the specific number of people with confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 who die as a result of the disease. This is usually a very specific number, such as “out of 100 people diagnosed with COVID-19, 1 person dies.” The CFR is a proportion of deaths per total confirmed cases.
Mortality rate is a more general approximation of the number of deaths that occur within a larger population. This number might be something like “out of a population of 100,000 people, 10 people die from a specific disease.” The mortality rate is a number of fatal cases per a given population.
Centers for Disease Control (CDC): The United States' federal health protection organization. Also called The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Communicable – Similar in meaning as "contagious." Used to describe diseases that can be spread or transmitted from one person to another.
Community spread – The spread of an illness within a particular location, like a neighborhood or town. During community spread, there's no clear source of contact or infection.
Confirmed case : Someone tested and confirmed to have COVID-19.
Congregate settings: Public places that can get crowded and where contact with infected people can happen. This includes places like malls, theaters, and grocery stores.
Contact tracing: identifying and monitoring people who may have come into contact with an infectious person. In the case of COVID-19, monitoring usually involves selfquarantine as an effort to control the spread of disease. Contactless: without contact; for example, “contactless delivery” would include leaving purchased items at the entryway of a home rather than handing it directly to a person.
Coronavirus: A family of related viruses. Many of them cause respiratory illnesses. Coronaviruses cause COVID-19, SARS, MERS, and some strains of influenza, or flu. The coronavirus that causes COVID-19 is officially called SARS-CoV-2, which stands for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2.
COVID-19: The name of the illness caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. COVID-19 stands for "coronavirus disease 2019.”
Death rate: Is a catch-all term that breaks down into two specific numbers: the case fatality rate and the mortality rate.
Epidemic: A situation where more cases of disease than expected happen in a given area or to a group of people.
Epidemiology: The branch of medicine that studies how diseases happen and spread in communities of people. A person who studies epidemiology is called an epidemiologist.
Flattening the curve: Controlling the rate of new cases of COVID-19. The “curve” refers to a graph showing the number of cases of COVID-19 that happen over a period of time. Many cases happening in a short period of time create a graph that looks like a tall spike.
By using protective measures, we can slow down how many new cases happen. This is the “flattening” of the curve – on the graph, the flattened curve winds up looking more like a gentle hill.
Too many new cases happening in a short time can create a serious problem. Hospital systems only have so many supplies, like beds and PPE. There are also only so many doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers. Too many patients at one time can overwhelm these resources. This means sick and injured people may not get needed treatment.
Flattening the curve reduces the numbers of people needing healthcare at one time. This allows hospitals to treat patients throughout the pandemic.
Hand hygiene: A key strategy for slowing the spread for COVID-19. Washing hands with soap and water for at least 20 seconds is one of the most important steps to take to protect against COVID-19 and many other diseases.
Herd immunity: also known as community immunity, this is the reduction in risk of infection within a population, often because of previous exposure or vaccination.
Hot spot: Geographic area where the number of diagnosed cases of, and/ or hospitalizations for, COVID-19 has spiked.
Hydroxychloroquine: an oral drug used to treat malaria, rheumatoid arthritis and lupus. Its effectiveness in treating patients with COVID-19 disease is still in question by the medical community at large.
Immune surveillance: the process of monitoring the immune system’s activities, which may include the detection and destruction of foreign substances, cells or tissues.
Immunity: Your body's ability to resist or fight off an infection. Your immune system is a network of cells throughout your body that help you avoid getting infected and help you get better when you are infected
Immunocompromised: Also called immunecompromised or immunodeficient. This describes someone who has an immune system that can't resist or fight off infections as well as most people. This can be caused by several illnesses. Some treatments for illnesses can also cause someone to be immunocompromised.
Incubation period: The time it takes for someone with an infection to start showing symptoms. For COVID-19, symptoms appear 2-14 days after infection.
“Long-haulers”: Mild or moderate COVID-19 lasts about two weeks for most people. But others experience lingering health problems even when they have recovered from the acute phase of the illness. In such patients, there is no longer live coronavirus running amok in the body. If tested, the person would test negative for the coronavirus, but they might be severely debilitated nonetheless.
More common terms are post-COVID syndrome, long COVID or long-term COVID. People living with post-COVID syndrome are sometimes known as “long haulers.”
According to the CDC, the most common lasting symptoms are fatigue, shortness of breath, cough, joint pain and chest pain. Other issues include cognitive problems, difficulty concentrating, depression, muscle pain, headache, rapid heartbeat and intermittent fever.
Monoclonal antibodies: The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency use authorization (EUA) for casirivimab and imdevimab to be administered together for the treatment of mild to moderate COVID-19 in adults and pediatric patients (12 years of age or older weighing at least 88 pounds. Casirivimab and imdevimab, administered together, were shown to reduce COVID-19-related hospitalization or emergency room visits in patients at high risk for disease progression within 28 days after treatment when compared to placebo. The safety and effectiveness of this investigational therapy for use in the treatment of COVID-19 continues to be evaluated.
N95 respirator: Sometimes casually referred to as an “N95 mask,” this PPE is worn on providers’ faces, forming a tight seal around the nose and mouth. Though it looks like a surgical mask, an N95 is actually a respirator that filters out at least 95% of particles in the air. What’s more, it requires a 20-minute “fit test” to ensure proper fitting—and it does not provide adequate protection for people with facial hair. The CDC does not recommend N95 respirators for public use. Nasal oxygen: providing oxygen into the patient’s body via nasal cannula (tubing). This measure usually provides a supplement to the patient’s normal supply of oxygen.
Novel coronavirus: a new strain of coronavirus, or nCoV, that has never been detected in humans.
Outbreak: A sudden increase of a specific illness in a small area. Can also be called “a cluster.”
Pandemic: When a new disease spreads to many countries around the world.
Patient zero: the first individual infected with a disease during an epidemic.
PPE: Stands for personal protective equipment. This includes masks, face shields, gloves, gowns and other coverings that healthcare workers use to prevent the spread of infection to themselves and other patients.
Person under investigation (PUI): When a health provider suspects a person has the coronavirus. But no test has confirmed the infection.
Presumptive positive case: When a person tests positive for the coronavirus, but the CDC hasn't confirmed the case.
Quarantine: Sometimes called "isolation." Quarantines keep people away from each other to prevent the spread of disease. Stay-at-home orders are a type of quarantine. Governments sometimes order quarantines to keep healthy people from exposure to infected people. They give rules to behavior and boundaries to movement.
Rapid Test: One of several brands of COVID-19 infection tests, sold over-the-counter.
Remdesivir: an investigational antiviral drug that is administered intravenously and inhibits viral replication. It is a promising drug for the treatment of COVID-19 disease and was first developed to treat Ebola.
Screening: This is not the same as a coronavirus test. This step helps healthcare workers to decide if you actually need a coronavirus test. It’s a series of basic questions about your health condition and recent history. Screening may also include other common healthcare procedures, like taking your temperature.
Self-isolation: Also called self-quarantine. Separating yourself when you’re sick from healthy individuals to prevent spreading illness.
Shelter in place: An order for people to stay where they are and not leave for their own protection. A stay-at-home order is a kind of shelter-in-place order.
Social distancing: Also called physical distancing. It means putting space between yourself and other people at all times. The goal is to slow down how fast an infection spreads. Stay-at-home orders are a way that the government can enforce social distancing. The CDC recommends keeping at least six feet between you and others around you in public. Social distancing also includes avoiding crowds and groups in public.
Spanish flu: also known as the 1918 influenza pandemic, this was the most severe pandemic in recent history according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), with an estimated 500 million infections and 50 million deaths worldwide. It was caused by an H1N1 virus with genes of an avian origin.
Super spreader: One person who, for unknown reasons, can infect an unusually large number of people. Infectious disease specialists say it is common for super-spreaders to play a large role in the transmission of viruses. In what's known as the 80/20 rule, 20% of infected patients may drive 80% of transmissions.
Symptomatic: When a person shows signs of illness. For COVID-19, that includes cough, fever or shortness of breath.
Vaccine: A vaccine triggers the immune system to help it build immunity to a disease. The immune system already has the capacity to react to diseases by producing substances called antibodies that remain in the body to fight them in the future. With a vaccine, you don’t have to get the disease to develop immunity—the vaccine triggers the same process by providing the body with a tiny amount of a germ that has been weakened or killed, but small enough that it won’t make you sick. Vaccines are introduced to the body via injection, mouth, or a nasal spray.
Ventilator: A machine that supplies oxygen to a patient with severe lung issues. People with severe cases of COVID-19 can't provide enough oxygen to their body. Their lungs are too limited. A ventilator machine requires a specialist or respiratory therapist. It is more invasive than an oxygen mask. Many hospitals don't have a supply of ventilators big enough for the COVID-19 outbreak.
World Health Organization (WHO):
This United Nations organization monitors and protects public health around the world.
Zoonotic: This means that a disease was originally was detected in animal, but is now infecting people also.
Sources: Texas Medical Center; UVA Health; www.yalemedicine.org; The Kaiser Family Foundation, BBC and the American Red Cross