Travel Med Infect Dis
. 2020 Sep 21;101884.
doi: 10.1016/j.tmaid.2020.101884. Online ahead of print.
Epidemiological and Clinical Characteristics of the First 557 Successive Patients with COVID-19 in Pernambuco State, Northeast Brazil
Jurandy J?nior Ferraz de Magalh?es 1 , Renata Pessoa Germano Mendes 2 , Caroline Targino Alves da Silva 2 , Severino Jefferson Ribeiro da Silva 2 , Klarissa Miranda Guarines 2 , Lindomar Pena 3 , Others for the Pernambuco COVID-19 Research Group
Affiliations
- PMID: 32971239
- DOI: 10.1016/j.tmaid.2020.101884
Abstract
Background: South America is the current epicenter of COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, the epidemiological and clinical features of the disease have not been described in Brazil, the third most affected country in the world.
Methods: In this retrospective study, we describe the demographics, epidemiology and clinical features of the first 557 consecutive patients positive for SARS-CoV-2 living in Pernambuco state, Northeast Brazil.
Results: The first COVID-19 cases occurred in the high income population. The age of infected patients ranged from 27 days to 97 years with a median of 47 years. The ratio of males to female in the SARS-CoV-2-infected group was 0.83:1. The most common symptom was cough (74.51%), followed by fever (66.79%), dyspnea (56.01%), sore throat (28.19%) and O2 saturation <95% (24.42%). 86.44% of the lethal cases were patients older than 51 years. The median time from illness onset to diagnosis was 4.0 days (range 0 to 39 days) Severe patients diagnosed after 14 days of symptoms onset had higher viral load than patients with mild disease.
Conclusions: Our study provides important information about COVID-19 in the tropics and will assist physicians and health officials to face the current pandemics as SARS-CoV-2 continues to spread in the human population.
Keywords: Clinical characteristics; Coronavirus disease 2019; SARS-CoV-2; clinics; demographics; epidemiology.