Epidemic and pandemic-prone diseases | News | Update on Middle East respiratory syndrome, March 2015

Update on Middle East respiratory syndrome, March 2015

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Highlights

  • A total of 967 laboratory-confirmed cases of MERS-CoV, including 379 deaths (case-fatality rate 39%) were reported from Saudi Arabia. Of these, a total of 145 cases, including 58 deaths (case-fatality rate 40%), were reported in 2015 to date.
  • The epidemiological and demographic characteristics of the disease do not show any significant difference. The majority of cases continue to be male and the most affected age group among primary cases are those between 50 and 59 years of old.
  • Nosocomial outbreaks in hospitals, though smaller in size and risk, as compared to the past, have been reported from Riyadh, Qassem, Al-Jouf and eastern Regions.
  • Since the last big hospital outbreak in Jeddah in 2014, nosocomial infection reported among health care workers have continued to decline (from as high as 25% to 12%).

Read the latest update on MERS-COV

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