Africa has been spared so far from coronavirus. Why? | DW | 14.02.2020
Too warm for COVID-19?
Another theory is that the continent is too warm for the COVID-19 virus to thrive.
Coronaviruses, which include some of the viruses responsible for the common cold and flu, can show something called seasonality — that is, they peak and wane depending on the season.
Many cold and flu viruses peak in winter, for example; the droplets sneezed and coughed out by people spread more easily in winter's cold dry air and when people are crowded inside together.
They then die down in warmer weather.
"When the season is warmer and more humid, the droplets transmitting the [flu virus] tend to fall out of the air more quickly, therefore limiting its transmission," explained Yap Boum, the Africa representative for Epicentre, the research arm of Doctors without Borders (MSF).
Tropical countries aren't immune from seasonality, with flu peaking in the dry season in countries like Cameroon, Boum told DW.
However, not all coronaviruses spread through respiratory droplets and Boum cautions that it is too early to tell if COVID-19 is transmitted in a similar fashion.
"We have no background information ... so we can't yet tell," he said.
However, he said, it still "might be more prudent for countries like South Africa, which will start heading into winter, to follow how the winter will affect or not the transmission of the novel coronavirus."
'Doubt a big outbreak in Africa'
Epidemiologist Paul Hunter also emphasizes that the COVID-19 virus "hasn't been around long enough" to know if its transmission will be affected by a change in seasons.
But even if the coronavirus makes its way to Africa, Hunter doesn't believe the continent will be as hard hit as China.
