Will Coronavirus Pandemic Diminish by Summer?

Abstract

The novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) that began 2 months ago in Wuhan, China, has spread rapidly to multiple countries and has been declared a pandemic by WHO on March 11, 2020. While influenza virus has been shown to be affected by weather, it is unknown if COVID19 is similarly affected. In this work we analyze the effect of local weather on the transmission of the 2019-nCoV virus. Our results indicate that the maximum number of 2019-nCoV transmissions has so far occurred within a certain range of temperature (3 to 13C), and the total number of cases in countries with mean Jan-Feb-March temperature > 18C has been less than 5%. This temperature dependency is also evident within the USA, with outbreak growth rate of southern states (Texas, Florida, Georgia, Arizona) lower than northern states (Washington, New York, Colorado and Utah). The growth rate of California lies in between northern and southern states. The north-south divide observed in the US further suggests that transmission of 2019-nCoV virus might be less efficient at warmer temperatures and therefore with approaching summer temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere, the spread of 2019-nCoV might decline in the next few months. This hypothesis we propose here is based upon currently available data and will automatically be tested in the next few weeks with reports of new cases both within the USA and other countries. If the relation between temperature and 2019-nCoV cases presented here persists for the next few weeks, the spread in several countries of the Northern Hemisphere and the southern part of the US should be limited. This can allow the health agencies and NGOs to focus on the appropriate geographical regions, for example the northern part of the US, which typically experience temperatures below 15 C until May, and the approaching winter temperatures in the Southern Hemisphere, to contain the spread of 2019-nCoV.