A New Respiratory Tract Infection

MERS-CoV particles under negative stain electron microscopy
Virions contain club-like projections emanating from
 membrane. Image courtesy of CDC

    

Human serum antibodies react with MERS infected  Vero cells,
indicating infection.  Image courtesy of CDC

There's a new kid on the block among respiratory tract infections, and it goes by MERS, or Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, first confirmed in Saudi Arabia in 2012.  Symptoms of infection include fever, cough, and shortness of breath, all signs of severe acute respiratory illness.  Its mortality rate is greater than 30% for those infected. 

This syndrome is caused by a coronavirus called MERS-CoV.  Coronaviruses, named for their crown-like morphology.  They are common viruses and usually cause mild to moderate upper-respiratory tract infections. There are three main subgroups and a recently-assigned new sub group, alpha, beta, gamma, and delta, respectively. 

 The ones that affect humans are alpha 229E and NL63, and beta OC473, HKU1, and SARS-CoV (responsible for severe acute respiratory syndrome prior to 2004).  Typical symptoms of non-SARS coronaviruses are coughing, runny nose, sore throat, and fever.  It may also cause lower-respiratory tract infections in the elderly and immunocompromised

Why is this virus important? Because like SARS, it has left its origin country and infected two U.S. patients that had traveled to Saudi Arabia--one on May 2nd, 2014 and a second one May 11th, 2014.  The first patient has made a full recovery and the second is currently hospitalized but recovering. Don’t panic--at this time there is a low risk to the general American public at this time and those that had contact with the two infected are being contacted.  

For more information, please visit: CDC.gov

For a more technical review of this topic: MERS-CoV Interim Guidelines

Update 5/15/15: healthcare workers exposed to the MERS patients have been sent home for 14 days after two showed flu-like symptoms. Neither are confirmed MERS patients as of now. 

Resource: CNN.com