ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the pathogenesis of viral infections and specifically the immunologic and immunogenic mechanisms and theories of SARS-CoV-2, followed by the clinical diagnostic and therapeutic considerations of coronavirus infections. It presents the profound epidemiologic and public health implications associated with the COVID-19 global pandemic. An endemic level of disease can be defined as that level of observable disease found in a community and considered a baseline or expected level. Outbreaks of infectious disease have shaped the economic, political, and social aspects of human civilization, their effects often lasting for centuries. These outbreaks have defined some of the basic tenets of modern medicine with the development of the principles of epidemiology, prevention, immunization, and the field of public health. Viruses are not living cells or organisms. They are obligate parasites that lack metabolic machinery of their own to generate energy or to synthesize proteins.
