MERS spreading into South Korea and China now.

[asbrown]

Reuters reports tonight that eight more people have been infected with the virus, bringing the total to 95. It was also reported today that a seventh person has died, accordingly, Hong Kong officials are set to issue a red alert, advising travelers to avoid non-essential travel. Despite this red alert, the CDC is still advising American's that it is safe to travel to South Korea.

Furthermore, the government still insists that there have been no cases of an infection in any social setting outside of hospitals and has emphasized that MERS spreads from close contact with an ill person, usually by caring for them.

Do you know whether it has spread to the mainland, or if it is still confined to Hong Kong? There's a ton of cross boarder traffic, but they can be pretty thorough checking everyone going back and forth. Hong Kong is a beautiful city, and I hate to think of the damage the disease could do, but they are much better equipped to deal with this kind of situation that any cities on the mainland.

[dillinger10]

Today's update, courtesy of The AFP brought both good news and bad. The good news is that 67 people who had previously tested positive for the MERS virus in South Korea have now fully recovered and been discharged from the hospital. Also, for the third day in a row, there were no new fatalities. The bad news, unfortunately, is that four more people were diagnosed with the virus, bringing the total number of cases to 179 while 3,100 remain under quarantine at state facilities or at home.

[Zyni]

Wow, that escalated quickly. In less than 24 hours the number of people quarantined rose from 10 to more than 700 though given that both South Korea and China are so densely populated areas this should probably not be a surprise. I just read this article which provides some alarming numbers, including the fact that of the 1,139 laboratory-confirmed cases of MERS globally, 37 percent (431 people) have died. This makes this a potentially lethal epidemic, especially with no curable vaccine currently available.

Those numbers are ... jaw dropping. From 10 to more than 700 in a 24 hour period? That's insane. I guess close quarters is really problematic. This is a frightening situation. That a deadly disease can be spread that quickly is of great concern. Alarming indeed. Are they offering precautions? Are their any good methods for trying to avoid being infected other than hiding from the population at large?

[dillinger10]

It has been a while since this thread has been updated but there was some news today as the South Korean government declared an end to its outbreak of MERS as there have been no new cases reported for more than three weeks.

During the outbreak, which began on May 20, more than 16,000 people were quarantined, 186 were infected and 36 died.

Not surprisingly, tourism has been greatly affected since the outbreak of the virus. Tourist arrivals into South Korea dropped more than 40% in June and almost 60% in the first 15 days of July.

[BranTheScooterMan]

Western media has not reported on this in the least.
Please keep updating this is great information.
Hopefully public health officials can get it under wraps soon.