US man in Wuhan shares his perspective

Stephen C McClure, 64, a US research associate working at Wuhan University's Key Laboratory of Information Engineering in Surveying, Mapping and Remote Sensing (LIESMARS).

I live alone in Wuhan, and everything is good.

I have been working at Wuhan University for nine years, helping students, faculty, and staff polish academic papers on subjects ranging from computer science to electrical engineering, helping authors through the publication process. Before that, I was at George Mason University in the United States; many of my associates were from Wuhan. A visiting professor invited me to work in Wuhan for a year, and after that, I decided to stay longer.

I first heard about the coronavirus in the last week of December, from the foreign affairs personnel at our lab. At first, it was an unexplained cluster of cases associated with a local market. At the time nobody was certain how it was transmitted, and whether it was animal-to-human or otherwise.

There was not any evidence suggesting it could be passed between humans at the point. However, many of us began taking precautions, such as staying away from crowded places, washing hands, not taking crowed elevators and wearing masks in some cases.

These are the same type of precautions recommended during the cold and flu season. I only began wearing a mask after the lockdown started Jan 23. Right now, I am following the public health recommendations, and staying in my apartment as much as possible. Currently I am trying to figure out if I can work remotely, reading papers at home, even though face-to-face is much more effective. A health hotline has been set up so that foreigners at our lab can get medical help, if necessary. The biggest problem is eating.