1. Introduction
Since December 2019, a cohort of patients in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China, has suffered from unknown etiology acute respiratory disease. The first cases showed a connection to the Huanan wholesale market for seafood. The Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found a new coronavirus, previously referred to by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) as severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2, formerly referred to as 2019-nCoV), by analyzing the patient’s throat swab sample. Human angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) molecules strongly interact with the SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein’s receptor-binding domain (RBD). This gives human respiratory epithelial cells a high infectious proficiency of the virus. The virus induces exhaustion, fever, cough, and serious or moderate breathing impediments. SARS-CoV-2 is referred to as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), which showed moderate symptoms in the majority of patients (1). Early disease detection helps to provide necessary, appropriate care for clinicians. The clinical and epidemiological features of coronavirus were examined by Zheng et al. (2). Treatment, radiological, laboratory, clinical, demographic, and epidemiological data were used for 99 confirmed patients in China with COVID-19. As typical symptoms, they reported fever, tiredness, and dry cough. The median age of patients registered is 49 years, 41 percent had the underlying disorder, 49 percent had near interaction with patients affected by COVID19, and 42 percent had resided or traveled to Wuhan. Lower counts of CD8 and CD4, lower white blood cells, lymphocytes, and neutrophils; higher levels of natriuretic peptides in the brain; higher myocardial damage levels, and higher C-reactive proteins can be used for early detection of disease in seriously ill patients. (1).
The severity of the COVID-19 pandemic is associated with the survival of individuals, and evaluating the level of severity, especially in individuals with chronic diseases, improves the quality of life and can reduce the mortality rates caused by this virus. The severity of the COVID-19 disease was divided into four stages, i.e., mild, moderate, extreme, and serious, in accordance with the Guidelines provided by the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, Japan, on the Diagnosis and Treatment of Novel Coronavirus. In short, the mild disease was characterized as a lack of respiratory symptoms, no radiological pulmonary manifestations, and levels of oxygen saturation (SpO2) of about 96 percent. The moderate disease was defined as mild respiratory symptoms, 93 percent < SpO2 < 96 percent, and radiological evidence of pneumonia. Severe cases were described as oxygen support requiring SpO2 93 percent. Critical was described as requiring support for acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) by the heart-lung machine or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) (3).
Medical signs, personal traits, and demographic characteristics were strongly associated with COVID-19 infection in various research studies. Other clinical characteristics, specifically obesity, cardiovascular disease, and hypertension, have also been reported in studies as important factors influencing the rate of COVID19 infection. On the other hand, studies discuss the demographic characteristics strongly associated with COVID-19 disease worldwide, such as a country’s gross domestic product ratio, smoking prevalence, a country’s average annual temperature, etc. (4).
Understanding clinical/demographic features, progression, and prognosis of the COVID-19 disease may help recognize critically ill patients, provide appropriate care, and avoid mortality (5). In light of this important data, this research aims to design an intelligent model that predicts the disease severity level by modeling the relationships between the severity of COVID-19 infection and the various demographic/clinical characteristics of individuals.