Correlation of the global spread of coronavirus disease-19 with atmospheric air temperature

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is an enveloped virus that may be sensitive to heat. We assessed whether the spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) correlates with air temperature. We also studied whether additional climate, geographical, and population variables were correlated. The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases and mortality rates reported in each country between 1 ^st Jan and 31 ^st Mar 2020 were compared with the country’s three-month average atmospheric air temperature, precipitation and latitude. Spearman’s correlation coefficient (ρ) was used to identify significant correlations. Our analysis included a total of 748,555 confirmed COVID-19 cases worldwide. The total number of patients with COVID-19 decreased with increasing atmospheric air temperature (ρ = –0.54, 95%CI: [-0.64, –0.42]; P <0.001) and increased with an increasing latitude (ρ = 0.60, 95%CI: [0.48, 0.70]; P <0.001). Our findings justify further studies to examine the effect of air temperature on infectivity of SAR-CoV-2.