TITLE:
Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Conakry, Republic of Guinea: Analysis and Relationship with Meteorological Factors
AUTHORS:
Ibrahima Kalil Kante, Ibrahima Diouf, Tamba Nicolas Millimono, Jean Moussa Kourouma
KEYWORDS:
Conakry, Guinea, COVID-19, Meteorological Factors, Temperature, Humidity
JOURNAL NAME:
Atmospheric and Climate Sciences,
Vol.11 No.2,
April
14,
2021
ABSTRACT: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by
severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), dates back to
December 29, 2019, in Wuhan, China. It quickly spreads like wildfire to all
continents in the following months. In Guinea, the first case of COVID-19 and
death were all reported respectively on March 12 and April 16, 2020. Since
then, several studies have found a relationship between certain environmental
conditions such as the meteorological factors to have the potential of
contributing to the spread of the virus. Thus, this study aims at examining the
extent to which observed meteorological factors might have contributed to the
spread of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases in Conakry, from March
1 to May 31, 2020. Meteorological factors such as temperature (Tmin,
Tmean and Tmax) and relative humidity (RHmin,
RHmean and RHmax) were analyzed together with the data on
the COVID-19. The dynamic of the COVID-19 in Guinea was analyzed along with
that of some west African countries. The analysis on the dynamic of the COVID-19
pandemic in West Africa indicated Guinea as one of the most affected countries
by the pandemic after Nigeria and Ghana. The study found that in general an
increase in the temperature is linked to a decline in the COVID-19 number of
cases and deaths, while an increase in the humidity is positively correlated to
the number of cases and deaths. Nevertheless, from this study it was also
observed that low temperature, mild diurnal temperature and high humidity are
likely to favor its transmission. The study therefore, recommends that habitations
and hospital rooms should be kept in relatively low humidity and relatively
higher temperature to minimize the spread of the (SARS-CoV-2).