COVID‐19 and gastrointestinal endoscopy: Importance of reducing SARS‐CoV‐2 infection risks of medical workers and preserving personal protective equipment resources

Onoyama, Takumi; Isomoto, Hajime

In December 2019, the World Health Organization (WHO) was informed of cases of pneumonia of unknown etiology detected in Wuhan, China. Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus‐2 (SARS‐CoV‐2), a novel coronavirus, was identified and SARS‐CoV‐2 related disease, called coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19), has spread worldwide. The WHO has declared COVID‐19 to be a pandemic on March 11, 2020. Clinical symptoms of the COVID‐19 includes cough (67.8%), fever (43.8%), fatigue (38.1%), production of sputum (33.7%), and shortness of breath (18.7%). Gastrointestinal symptoms of COVID‐19 include nausea or vomiting (5.0%), as well as diarrhea (3.8%) (1). It is estimated that 1.2% of infected subjects are asymptomatic, but the rate of severe disease is 13.9% with an overall mortality rate of 2.3% (2).