COVID Chaos

COVID Chaos is a book about the 2019 SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic that was written real time, spanning the time from March 31, 2020 through December 31, 2021, by two Emeritus Professors of Infectious Diseases (Adult - RJS, Pediatrics - JSA). RJS's and JSA's careers began with the HIV pandemic, involved collaboration with the 2009 Influenza pandemic, and now are finishing up with the Coronavirus pandemic. The authors have broad experience with outbreaks, from the local level (RJS had career long responsibilities for controlling outbreaks at medical school hospitals and worked taking care of COVID-19 patients during the pandemic), all the way up to the pandemic level (JSA wrote a book about the 2009 Influenza pandemic and has worked with the WHO for the past 10 years. The aim of the book is to give the reader some insight into the global impact of the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak during the first two years, from multiple perspectives (patient, healthcare provider, global citizen, public health, economic, geopolitical). An attempt was also made to understand how SARS-CoV-2 caused disease, both its pathogenesis at the individual patient level, and globally, as to how it was so successful at causing a pandemic and how it compares with other organisms capable of causing outbreaks, epidemics and pandemics. It is written to be of interest to anyone who likes to read and wants to know more about what happened during the COVID-19 pandemic and why. COVID Chaos was written by two infectious disease physicians, who each have over 35 years of experience caring for patients with a large variety of infectious diseases. Additionally, both did research in understanding the pathogenesis of infectious diseases, and collectively have many years of experience handling outbreaks at the local level, have been involved with guideline documents making recommendations for reducing infections at the national level, and have global experience managing international infectious diseases. The book begins with three first person accounts from physicians involved in COVID-19 care during the early pandemic, when it was overwhelming hospitals. It then tracks its course from Wuhan, China, to other parts of the world, while comparing and contrasting public health interventions, both at the hospital and local community level, all the way up to country level. The book attempts to understand the broad spectrum of COVID-19 disease, both clinically and pathophysiologically, as well as its global collateral damage. It explores in depth SARS-CoV-2 vaccine development, testing and the geopolitical problems with vaccine deployment, and attempts to understand the origin of SARS-CoV-2 and its place in the pantheon of other organisms causing pandemics. The book concludes with some late breaking pandemic events at the end of 2021 (Omicron variant, etc.) and a global photo essay about the pandemic.