The causal agent of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), which belongs to the genus Betacoronavirus of the Coronaviridae family. Other coronaviruses that caused epidemics are SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV. SARS-CoV-2 is a positive-sense RNA genome, is extremely infectious, and has claimed more than 3.7 million lives worldwide. The transmission of the disease occurs via respiratory droplets from infected individuals.
