Is the spread of COVID-19 across countries influenced by environmental, economic and social factors?

Mohammad Alamgir Hossain

The speed of human-to-human transmission of the pathogen is unprecedented. It has spread to most of the countries of the world within 4 months of its first known transmission to human and the number of infected people as well as the number of deaths caused by the virus is increasing every day till date. The first human case of present outbreak of Coronavirus is identified in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province of China, in December, 2019 1,2 . Though the virus is spreading many countries, the speed and severity of spread vary country to country. Europe is badly affected than Asia, Africa and South America. Though South Korea, Thailand, Japan and Singapore were affected immediately after China, wide-spread infections were observed in Italy and Spain before those countries. Despite having political and economic connection and national borders with China, Myanmar and North Korea report very few cases of infection. Other European countries and USA were also hit within a very short period.