Mike Stobbe, The Associated Press
Published Thursday, May 16, 2013 8:18AM EDT
Last Updated Thursday, May 16, 2013 7:52PM EDT
NEW YORK — A deadly new respiratory virus related to SARS has apparently spread from patients to health care workers in eastern Saudi Arabia, health officials said Wednesday.
The Ministry of Health in Saudi Arabia told world health officials that two health care workers became ill this month after being exposed to patients with the virus. One is critically ill.
Since September 2012, the World Health Organization has been informed of 40 confirmed cases of the virus, and 20 of the patients have died. The deaths occurred in Britain, Germany, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan.
A transmission electron micrograph of novel coronavirus particles, colorized in yellow, is shown. (Handout/National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases)
Experts have suggested calling the new virus MERS, for Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, but officials have not signed off on that yet.Experts are watching carefully for signs that the deadly virus can spread from person-to-person. Health officials say the virus has likely already spread between people in some circumstances, including hospital patients in France.
The new virus has caused severe respiratory disease in patients, some of them needing mechanical ventilators to help them breathe.
One of the Saudi health care workers is a 45-year-old man who is in critical condition. The other is a 43-year-old woman in stable condition. No other details about their jobs or where they work were released. Health workers were previously infected in a cluster in Jordan, though that was before the new coronavirus had been identified and before any special measures were taken to prevent its spread. That is not the case in Saudi Arabia and officials worry any new spread to health workers could suggest the virus is becoming more transmissible to people.
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WHO Reprimands Saudi Arabia Facility: New Coronavirus Is Spreading Patient-To-Nurse
Two nurses in Saudi Arabia are added to the country’s list of now 30 infected individuals.
(Photo : CDC.gov) Common symptoms of the new coronavirus (nCoV) have been acute, serious respiratory illness with fever, cough, shortness of breath, and breathing difficulties.
Two health care workers, one now in critical condition, caught the new coronavirus (nCoV) from patients in their care at a health care facility in the Eastern part of Saudi Arabia, the World Health Organization (WHO) reports in an update late on Wednesday. WHO has noted that all of the most recent cases are linked to a particular Saudi Arabian health care facility, which continues to remain unidentified in its updates on the disease.
A total of 21 patients, including nine deaths, have been reported in eastern Saudi Arabia from the outbreak since the beginning of May 2013 to date. The Ministry of Health in Saudi Arabia is conducting ongoing investigation of the outbreak, while WHO monitors the situation. Experts have suggested calling the new virus MERS, for Middle East respiratory syndrome, but officials have not yet signed off on it, Arab News reports.
“This is the first time health care workers have been diagnosed with (novel coronavirus) infection after exposure to patients,” WHO states of the two new laboratory-confirmed cases. Health care-associated transmission has been observed before with nCoV in Jordan last April, but this is a first for Saudi Arabia.
One of the two new patients is a 45-year-old man who became ill on May 2 and is currently in critical condition. The second patient is a 43-year-old woman with a coexisting health condition, who became ill on May 8 and is in stable condition.
In its update, WHO advises health care facilities providing care for patients with suspected nCoV infection to take appropriate measures to decrease the risk of transmission of the virus to other patients and health care workers. “Health care facilities are reminded of the importance of systematic implementation of infection prevention and control,” notes the United Nations Health Agency.
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Correction: New Virus story
NEW YORK — In a story May 15 about a new SARS-like virus spreading from patients to health care workers in Saudi Arabia, The Associated Press reported erroneously the location of the 20 deaths attributed to the virus. There have been no deaths reported in France and Qatar, only in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Germany and Britain.
The story also said that the spread to health care workers was new. Health workers were previously infected in a cluster in Jordan before the new coronavirus had been identified.
A corrected version of the story is below:
Saudi health workers sickened by SARS-like virus
2 Saudi Arabia health care workers get SARS-like virus; officials consider naming it MERS
By MIKE STOBBE
AP Medical Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — A deadly new respiratory virus related to SARS has apparently spread from patients to health care workers in eastern Saudi Arabia, health officials said Wednesday.
The Ministry of Health in Saudi Arabia told world health officials that two health care workers became ill this month after being exposed to patients with the virus. One is critically ill.
Since September 2012, the World Health Organization has been informed of 40 confirmed cases of the virus, and 20 of the patients have died. The deaths occurred in Britain, Germany, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan.
Experts have suggested calling the new virus MERS, for Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, but officials have not signed off on that yet.
Experts are watching carefully for signs that the deadly virus can spread from person-to-person. Health officials say the virus has likely already spread between people in some circumstances, including hospital patients in France.
Read Full Article Here
Public Health Agency of Canada
Dr. Allison McGeer in a laboratory at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto on Tuesday January 27, 2004. (/Frank Gunn / The Canadian Press)
A Saudi health ministry official visits patients infected with a new SARS-like virus at a hospital in the eastern Saudi province of al-Ahsaa on May 13, 2013. AFP PHOTO/STRRIYADH: Panic gripped Saudis in the country’s east on Monday, where most cases of the deadly Coronavirus have been detected, witnesses said, as the death toll from the SARS-like virus in the kingdom hit 15.
