MERS Statement n°3

STATEMENT FROM THE FISU MEDICAL COMMITTEE CHAIR, Lawrence D. RINK, M.D.

– 1. A joint mission by the World Health Organization and Republic of Korea’s Ministry of Health and Welfare reviewed the entire outbreak of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) on June 12, 2015. The recommendations are being carried out and include:

a. Strengthening contact tracing;

b. Monitoring and quarantine to be continued;

c. Expand laboratory testing.

– 2. The epidemiological pattern is similar to previous hospital associated MERS outbreaks in the Middle East and have been fully controlled in the past and will be fully controlled in this situation.

– 3. The virus continues to be clustered around health facilities and there is no evidence it is circulating in the community.

– 4. The current case count is 138 confirmed cases of MERS including one confirmed case in China with 14 deaths.

– 5. This virus was first identified in Saudi Arabia in 2012 and much is still unknown about the route of transmission.

– 6. We stress that FISU and GUOC are taking all measures to make sure this virus does not affect the Summer Universiade.

Additional statistics:

– As of June 12, 2015, 3,680 contacts have been identified.

– 3,453 are under home monitoring with the remaining under facility monitoring.

– 1,249 contacts have been released.

– The large number of patients being monitored makes the further detection of additional cases inevitable.

World Health Organization Advice:

– All states should continue their surveillance for acute respiratory infections.

– Infection prevention/control measures are critical.

– Health workers should always apply standard precautions consistently with all patients regardless of their diagnosis.

– Droplet precautions should be added to standard precautions when providing care to patients with symptoms of acute respiratory infection.

– Airborne precautions should be applied when performing aerosol generating procedures.

FISU will release bi-weekly reports unless other news requires earlier updates.