Coronavirus detected in 30-hour-old baby in China: reports

The novel coronavirus has been detected in at least two babies in China, the country's news agency CCTV said Thursday, with one of the two being only 30 hours old and total death toll from the epidemic rising to more than 560.

It was unsure, however, how the babies — both in Wuhan, the quarantined Chinese city at the centre of a viral coronavirus outbreak — were infected with the virus. No other details were made available to the media.

Possible ways included "mother-infant transmission", or "vertical transmission," since the woman who gave birth to the younger one was also diagnosed with the virus, as well as hospital staff or other mothers in the delivery process or breastfeeding their newborns.

Doctors explained that although the newborn — which weighed just over seven pounds, according to XinhuaNet — had stable vital signs and no fever or cough, it was experiencing shortness of breath.

The case "reminds us to pay attention to mother-to-child being a possible route of coronavirus transmission", the chief physician of Wuhan Children Hospital’s neonatal medicine department, Zeng Lingkong, said. Chest x-rays of the baby showed signs of infection and there were some abnormalities in the liver functions as well.

The second child was born on January 13 and possibly got it from either its nanny, diagnosed later, or the mother, detected with the virus days later. It started showing symptoms on January 29.

"Whether it was the baby’s nanny who passed to the virus to the mother who passed it to the baby, we cannot be sure at the moment," Zeng said. "But we can confirm that the baby was in close contact with patients infected with the new coronavirus, which says newborns can also be infected."

Neither of the two babies were in critical condition, he added.

According to medics at the Wuhan Children Hospital, pregnant women in whom coronavirus was detected could possibly pass it on to their children in the womb. The doctors made the comment after an infected woman gave birth to the baby, who, too, was diagnosed with the virus.

The epidemic has killed 563 people so far and at least 24,324 infection cases were been confirmed in mainland China.

The New York Post, citing the official Xinhua news agency, had reported on Monday that a baby born last week to an infected mother had tested negative. It added that as per China’s National Health Commission, the oldest person diagnosed with the virus is a 90-year-old.