EDIS Number: BH-20140524-43874-ARE
Date / time: 24/05/2014 06:03:38 [UTC]
Event: Biological Hazard
Area: Middle-East
Country: United Arab Emirates
State/County: Capital City
Location: Abu Dhabi
Number of Deads: N/A
Number of Injured: N/A
Number of Infected: 5 person(s)
Number of Missing: N/A
Number of Affected: N/A
Number of Evacuated: N/A
Damage level: N/A
Description:
The United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) revealed Friday that the health ministry of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has informed it of three additional laboratory-confirmed cases of human infection with Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) in the emirate of Abu Dhabi. WHO said all the three patients were males aged between 26 and 71 years. The UN agency said contact investigations are ongoing and added that further information will be communicated when available, From September 2012 to date, WHO has been informed of a total of 635 laboratory-confirmed cases of infection with MERS-CoV globally, including 193 deaths. Based on the current situation and available information, WHO urged all Member-States to continue their surveillance for Severe Acute Respiratory Infections (SARI) and carefully review any unusual patterns. WHO stressed that recent travelers returning from the Middle East who develop SARI should be tested for MERS-CoV as advised in the current surveillance recommendations. Coronaviruses are a family of viruses that can cause a range of ailments from the common cold to severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), which became an epidemic in 2003. The virus could be transmitted between people in close and prolonged contact. The sources of infection for the new coronavirus are still unclear. The deadly Novel Coronavirus (NCoV) strain, recently renamed MERS-CoV, reflects the fact that most of the reported cases are from that region, mainly Saudi Arabia. Nevertheless, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Tunisia, the US and the United Kingdom have also reported laboratory-confirmed cases of MERS-CoV infections. Those patients were either transferred there for care of the disease or returned from the Middle East and subsequently became ill.
Event updates:
Situation Update No. 2 on 2014-07-09 at 14:20:55.
Situation Update No. 1 on 2014-06-19 at 06:34:45.
