1 patient recovered, another died in MERS coronavirus

The Supreme Council of Health (SCH) in Qatar has announced the recovery of a patient inflected with MERS coronavirus and another passed away from the same deadly illness. The first patient started to show signs of the virus on August 15 before he came back from a trip outside the country. Once he was in the country, he was admitted to hospital to receive proper treatment. After a course of treatment, he recovered, the SCH statement read Saturday. The second patient, meanwhile, was battling several health issues. On August 17, he started showing signs of the deadly respiratory disease. He died after he was admitted to the intensive care unit. Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) is viral respiratory illness first reported in Saudi Arabia in 2012. It is caused by a coronavirus called MERS-CoV. Most people who have been confirmed to have MERS-CoV infection developed severe acute respiratory illness. They had fever, cough, and shortness of breath. About half of these people died. So far, all the cases have been linked to four countries in or near the Arabian Peninsula. No cases have been identified in the US. This virus has spread from ill people to others through close contact. However, the virus has not shown to spread in a sustained way in communities.