With the soaring number of COVID-19 confirmed cases in China since December 2022, many patients have developed “white lung,” severe pneumonia with bilateral lung lesions reaching 75 percent or more.
1. What Is “White Lung” and What Are the Symptoms?
“White lung” refers to a manifestation seen on chest X-rays and CT scans in cases of severe pneumonia. For a healthy person, in a chest X-ray or CT scan, the lungs appear black because they contain air. But when the lungs are severely infected or acutely injured, the tiny air sacs (alveoli) and capillaries in the lungs are damaged, and blood and fluid leak into the spaces between the air sacs and eventually into the air sacs, causing the alveoli to collapse. This is when patchy white shadows appear on the image; the lungs appear white, hence the term white lung….