Health officials have confirmed a second U.S. case of a deadly, mysterious virus that has sickened hundreds in the Middle East, but said the disease still poses little risk to the general population.
MERS, or Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, begins with flu-like fever and cough but can lead to shortness of breath, pneumonia and death.
A total of 538 lab confirmed cases of MERS have been reported, with 145 of those ending in death, said officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Florida Department of Health during a Monday news conference.
An Indian worker wears a mask as he touches a camel at his Saudi employer's farm on May 12, 2014 outside Riyadh. Saudi Arabia.
Most cases have been diagnosed in Saudi Arabia or elsewhere in the Middle East—Saudi Arabia alone reported 450 lab confirmed cases and 112 deaths. That is up from about 262 confirmed cases and 93 deaths earlier this month.
Read More: Saudi Arabia reports 5 more deaths from MERS
The latest American patient was a health-care provider living and working in Saudi Arabia and is now undergoing treatment in Florida.
The first U.S. case was diagnosed earlier this month in a man who traveled from Saudi Arabia to Indiana.
That man was a health-care worker at a hospital in Saudi Arabia's capital city who flew to the United States on April 24. After landing in Chicago, the man took a bus to Munster, Indiana, where he became sick and went to a hospital on April 28.
The man, an American, improved and was released from the hospital late last week. Tests of people who were around the man have all proved negative, health officials have said.
The two U.S. cases are unrelated, and CDC officials said the risk to the general population is still very low. The virus has not shown ability to spread easily from person to person in community settings.
Read More: Lebanon records first case of MERS virus
The CDC has set up quarantine stations at all major points of entry into the United States, and is reaching out to 500 people that had traveled on flight with the infected patient.
'Super bug' spreads
CNBC's Meg Tirrell reports the World Health Organization has confirmed about 262 cases of the MERS virus, of which 93 people have died. Dr. William Schaffner of the Vanderbilt School of Medicine, provides insight.
MERS belongs to the coronavirus family that includes the common cold and SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, which caused some 800 deaths globally in 2003.
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The MERS virus has been found in camels, but officials don't know how it is spreading to humans. It can spread from person to person, but officials believe that happens only after close contact. Not all those exposed to the virus become ill.
But it appears to be unusually lethal—by some estimates, it has killed nearly a third of the people it sickened. That's a far higher percentage than seasonal flu or other routine infections. But it is not as contagious as flu, measles or other diseases. There is no vaccine or cure and there's no specific treatment except to relieve symptoms.
Source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/101664563
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