How a patient with the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) deadly infect many others? That's one of the mysteries at the heart of an explosive outbreak of the viral disease in Korea that has so far sickened 41 and killed four. Now, scientists have a hypothesis last. According JongKoo Lee, director of the National University Hospital in Seoul and former chief of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC), poor ventilation in a zero-patient rooms in the hospital played an important role. The investigation is still ongoing, he warns. "But this is our tentative conclusion."
The first patient, a 68 year old male who had just returned from a business trip to the Middle East, was treated at several clinics before being diagnosed with MERS on May 20, nine days after he fell ill. He was treated at St. Mary's Hospital in Pyeongtaek, a city of about 1 hour south of Seoul, from May 15 to May 17 Most people sickened were attached to the same hospital.
The room in which zero patient remained behind for six people (the standard in Korea), but he had recently split, said Lee. There was only a small window that was closed for the day, and there was no ventilation. An air conditioning unit cycled the air in the room, Lee said Science Insider. "The air conditioner operates in that little room with the door closed, so we speculate that there is a very high density of virus particles in the air." He also said that MERS RNA was detected in the membrane air conditioning unit in the room.
None of the scientists conducting the investigation could be reached for comment, and a spokesman KCDC acknowledged only that " team of experts in various fields exploring the ventilation system [that] hospital. "Peter Ben Embarek, the point person MERS to the World Health Organization (WHO) said it was also informed of a lack of ventilation in the room." It's very difficult to draw conclusions based what little information we have. We hope to get a more detailed picture soon of this part of the investigation. "
Bad only the breakdown would be difficult to explain the catastrophic spread seen in the hospital, said Christian Drosten, a virologist at the University of Bonn in Germany. But if there was poor ventilation more a patient pay a larger amount than the usual virus, it could make a difference. In a study of tens of MERS patients in intensive care in Saudi Arabia, for example, some had a viral load much higher in their exhaled breath than others, he said. "This must have been so patient." In combination with the constant air circulation in the room, which could help explain the high number of infections, said Drosten.
"A very infectious cases, combined with poor control of infection can easily lead to this kind of cluster," said Mike Osterholm, director of the Center for Research on Infectious Diseases and policy the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. that this combination arrived in Seoul was bad luck, he said. "this could happen both in New York or Berlin." But the government in South Korea did botch the answer original, he said. "There was no reason to close schools, for example. And distributing more than many hospitals patients probably helped spread the virus, "he said. "But I think they are starting to do things."
After refusing for days to name the hospital in the heart of the epidemic, the Korean government has finally revealed at a press conference today that 30 of 41 patients were infected with St . Mary. The Ministry of Health has also asked people to contact a hotline if they had been in the hospital within 2 weeks after the patient index was admitted. Find and isolate these people is the key to stopping the epidemic, said Minister of Moon Hyung-pyo health. Already more than 1,0 people suspected of having had contact with a sick person were isolated.
Early today, which announced a joint mission with Korea "for information and examine the situation," including epidemiological models, the characteristics of viruses and clinical characteristics. A team of seven or eight scientists led by Keiji Fukuda, assistant director general for health security at WHO, is expected to arrive in Seoul this weekend, Ben Embarek said. The mission is expected to last about a week.
Meanwhile, KCDC completed its sequencing of MERS virus causing the current outbreak and only shared today with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A spokesman says it will release the sequence publicly tomorrow.
0 Komentar