By: Erin Allday, McClatchy News
The first case of a potentially deadly respiratory infection in the United States, identified Friday in an Indiana health care worker, has sparked fresh concern among California infectious disease experts who have been watching outbreaks in the Middle East and waiting for cases to reach America.
The disease, called Middle East Respiratory Syndrome or MERS, has infected about 400 people and killed at least 100 since it was first reported in Saudi Arabia in 2012, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It's caused by a coronavirus, which was also the culprit in Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome or SARS, which killed several hundred people worldwide about a decade ago.
On Sunday, state and federal health officials said the patient at Community Hospital in Munster, Ind., continued to improve and was in good condition.
The man left Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on April 24 and took two planes and a bus to travel back to Indiana via London and Chicago. He fell ill after his arrival with fever and shortness of breath on April 27 and was hospitalized the next day.
CDC officials say the threat of infection to the general public is very small because the virus does not spread easily from person to person. Still, public health authorities are contacting individuals, including travelers, who may have been close to the man and therefore exposed to the virus.
"In this interconnected world we live in, we expected MERS to make its way to United States. We have been preparing for this," said Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the CDC's National Center for Immunizations and Respiratory Diseases, on Friday. "We should not be surprised if additional cases are identified among health care providers who had close contact with the patient. People will understandably be concerned by the news."
http://www.emergencymgmt.com/health/MERS-Virus-Case-Concerns-Infectious-Disease-Experts.html
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