Is Coronavirus Airborne?

Yesterday, Zeng Qun deputy head of the Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau confirmed that Coronavirus can in fact be transmitted via Aerosols.

There still seems to be a lot of confusion as to whether or not Coronavirus is in fact an airborne pathogen.

How do viruses spread?

To get a better idea on how viruses spread, let’s take a look at Influenza. According to US National Library of Medicine, viruses are believed to be spread through two pathways: large respiratory droplets, and small particle droplet nuclei (aerosols).

Large droplets usually settle between 1-2 meters while aerosols can travel as far as 40 inches. Unfortunately, there there are only experimental studies that showed that Influenza can be transmitted across rooms. However, there is little evidence of actual aerosol transmission specifically for Influenza.

We can only assume that aerosol transmission can occur, but at the end of the day we don’t really know the exact numbers.

Is Coronavirus Airborne?

The answer depends on how you define airborne. There is no evidence that suggests that Coronavirus can be transmitted via anything other than aerosols or larger respiratory droplets. Assuming that’s true, that means Coronavirus can’t travel more than 40 inches.

That’s still quite the distance, but chances are you don’t have to worry about Coronavirus traveling miles and miles to infect you.

The fact of the matter is, if we know so little about Influenza we know even less about the novel Coronavirus.