7 more infected with MERS

Rashid Hassan

RIYADH: The Ministry of Health has confirmed seven new cases of MERS, five of them from Hofuf, a major urban Oasis in the Eastern Province, even as South Korea reported nine new cases.
The ministry on Saturday said that the patients who tested positive include a Saudi woman, 58, and four Saudi men aged 65, 56, 41 and 29 in Hofuf. A 58-year old expatriate man from Riyadh and a 55-year old expatriate man from Jeddah are the other two patients.
The total number of people affected by the virus has now reached 1,026 in the Kingdom since its outbreak in June 2012. The number of deaths has reached 450.
The South Korean Health Ministry has put the total number of people who tested positive for MERS at 50.
“The condition of four patients in Hofuf, including the woman is stable, while the 65-year-old man is stated to be in a critical condition. The other two patients in Riyadh and Jeddah are in a critical condition,” a ministry spokesman said. There are 11 active cases while two cases are on home isolation, he added.
Notably, the Command and Control Center (CCC), the disease fighting body of the ministry, is carrying out epidemiological surveillance tasks to make sure that all government and private health facilities are taking measures and coordinating with the relevant agencies including the World Health Organization (WHO).
The South Korean Health Ministry said the condition of the nine patients, including a health care worker at the hospital where an infected patient was treated, was stable.
The Korean ministry said: “One patient has recovered, becoming the first to be discharged from hospital in the country.”
The alarming increase in number of MERS infections in South Korea has placed the health authorities in the Asia’s fourth-largest economy on high alert with 1,800 people being placed in self-isolation as the epidemic has claimed four lives, so far.
Public alarm and government oversight in the country has triggered fear as the number of MERS cases rose to 50 since the outbreak, which was first reported on May 20.