The coronavirus pandemic has spread quickly across the globe in 2020 and we want to make sure that news sources are capitalizing the disease correctly when reporting on it.
Is COVID-19 Capitalized?
As we did in our headline on this page, the Associated Press says that the abbreviated name of the disease should be written in all capital letters as “COVID-19” which is short for “coronavirus disease 2019.”
This is also true for the official name of the disease “SARS-CoV-2” except that the “o” in this name is lowercase.
You should also capitalize other coronavirus diseases include “SARS” (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and “MERS” (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome).
Is Coronavirus Capitalized?
Even when referring to the novel (new) coronavirus, you should not capitalize coronavirus unless used in a headline or abbreviated to “COVID-19.”
The word “coronavirus” can refer to a number of different viruses ranging from the common cold to the 2019 novel coronavirus. Since there are a number of coronavirus variants, coronavirus is usually lowercase except when used in a headline.
Recommended Reading:
- Is pandemic capitalized?
- Are diseases capitalized?
- Are you an educator? Many online learnings companies are giving away their services for free to those impacted by coronavirus.
- Stuck at home during the outbreak? Read our best tips for working from home.
To learn more about proper title capitalization rules, give our free title capitalization tool a try.
COVID-19 is actually the name of the disease, not the virus (which is SARS-COV-2)
Right. The article is wrong to say COVID-19 is an abbreviation for coronavirus. As you said, it’s the name of the disease. Oddly, they explained “COVID-19” correctly above and “coronavirus” correctly below.
Also, the Associated Press is one news organization with one opinion. The New York Times (“Covid-19”) and the Washington Post (“covid-19”) are other news organizations, and they both disagree with AP.
Maybe look to the World Health Organization. They named COVID-19.
I have been typing it out as “CoViD-19” as in “CoronaVirusDisease-19”.