Analysis of Human to Human Transmission of Middle East Respiratory Syndrom Coronavirus (MER-CoV)

Viral Infection

MERS-CoV, Infection control, Case-control studies

This study aimed to analysis the characteristics of MERS transmission and the effect of our institutional personal protective equipment on the controlling the MERS at a tertiary Korean Hospital.

Between May 2015 and Nov 2015, total 186 cases of MERS-Cov infections were reported in South Korea. In June 2015, a female patient visited our emergency department (ED) for care of femur fracture. She was suspected of having MERS-Cov and isolated after 10 hours from the visit of our hospital because her clinical feature was not concordance with typical MERS-Cov infection and she denied the any contact of MERS-Cov patient. Before the transport to the isolation room, she stayed at ED during 8 hours, and admitted the general ward during 2 hours. Approximately 150 including the healthcare providers, patients and laypersons were exposed to the case-patient directly or indirectly. The investigators monitored all possible contacts in the hospital during that time, and analysed the CCTV data of hospital and interviewed all risk-persons. After the hospital outbreak ended, The investigators analysed the data of all behavior and contact history of MERS patient, epidermic and clinical data of infected patients and data of personal protective equipments (PPE) of all exposed persons. Descriptive analysis were conducted for basic epidemiology, transmission rout of MERS in hospital, and the effect of hospital infection control system and PPE of each contacts.