Mysterious SARS-like coronavirus may have spread human-to-human

LONDON British officials say a mysterious virus related to SARS may have spread between humans, as they confirmed the 11th case worldwide of the new coronavirus in a patient they say probably caught it from a family member.

The new virus was first identified last year in the Middle East and the 10 people who have previously been infected had all traveled to Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan or Pakistan.

According to Britain's Health Protection Agency, the latest patient is a U.K. resident with no recent travel to any of those countries but who had close personal contact with an earlier case. The patient may also have been at greater risk of infection due to an underlying medical condition and is currently in intensive care at a Birmingham hospital.

"Although this case provides strong evidence for person-to-person transmission, the risk of infection in most circumstances is still considered to be very low," John Watson, head of the respiratory diseases department at the Health Protection Agency, said in a statement. "If (the) novel coronavirus were more infectious, we would have expected to have seen a larger number of cases."

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• WHO: Six confirmed cases of SARS-like coronavirus in Middle East
• Middle East SARS-like mystery virus may come from animals

Six hospital staffers where the patient is being treated are being monitored for infection but none have so far showed any symptoms of the illness. The patient did not come into contact with any other hospital patients and is currently being kept in isolation.

The new coronavirus is part of a family of viruses that cause ailments including the common cold and SARS. In 2003, a SARS outbreak killed about 800 people worldwide.

Officials at the World Health Organization said the new virus has probably already spread between humans in some instances. In Saudi Arabia last year, four members of the same family fell ill and two died. And in a cluster of about a dozen people in Jordan, the virus may have spread at a hospital's intensive care unit.

"We know that, in some of those cases, there was close physical contact between family members caring for one another, so we can't rule out human-to-human transmission," said Gregory Hartl, a WHO spokesman.

He said there were still big gaps in the understanding of the novel coronavirus, which can cause acute pneumonia and kidney failure. Of the 11 cases to date, five people have died.

Health experts still aren't sure how humans are being infected. The new coronavirus is most closely related to a bat virus and scientists are considering whether bats or other animals like goats or camels are a possible source of infection.

Michael Osterholm, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Minnesota, warned the virus could be adapting into a more transmissible form. "At any moment the fire hydrant of human-to-human transmission cases could open," he said. "This is definitely a 'stay tuned' moment." He noted that before SARS sparked a worldwide epidemic, there were a handful of human-to-human cases, until something happened, like a virus mutation, which triggered an explosion of cases.

WHO says the virus is probably more widespread than just the Middle East and has advised countries to test any people with unexplained pneumonia.

[sharksareinthewater]

Please lets consider for a moment that this horsemeat issue has one other thing attached to it. Do you realize that its not taboo in the US to eat horse meat however, in US we are trying to stop legalization because of the communicable and sometimes incurable diseases our horses have. Not to mention all the illicit and illegal as well as legal vaccines, drugs, medications, growth hormones, and dewormers that are shop into horses. We have a growing trend of horses with LEptospirosa I personally had three die with it its highly contagious even to humans-they showed up with hazmat clothing to take the bodies away. I had to scour the premises and then I was told that I had to watch for symptoms for our own bodies? As well horses have AIDS, HEpatitis-I have proof actually documentation of this from UNIVERSITY. Plus we inject Bute, we give it paste, pills, and now its inside of some horse feeds and supplements feed daily-steriods, growth hormones, fertility enhancers, we actually FEED pesticide daily to our horses for fly control-we give them dewormers MARKED clearly fatal to all breeds of dogs, no for use in animals for food consumption. We are required by ALL american vets to feed dewormers every 90 days, some are feed through in feed box daily. Horses carry West Nile even if vaccined against it-encephlytis, HYPP, EIA, (which spreads like anthrax and requires euthanasia and burning the bodies.) I cant emphasize the products put in a horses body to get it to perform better that actually state DO not consume by humans or animals-do not touch with bare hands absorption causes cancer and blindness. So these unidentified illnesses people cant figure out-this horsemeat-its gonna kill people! US horse owners DO not eat horsemeat because we have been preaching to the choir for years you never eat anything that we put such dangerous chemicals in or on and have multiple diseases. In the past we allowed horse meat to be shipped out of the country because it did not affect our own children that way. Horse killer buyers determined that if other countries want to eat it and they die no skin off their nose-it's not their kids and grandkids exposed to it. I also want to have you ponder-if you go through a list of diseases interconnected to people that horses can contract because that list quadrupled in the past 10 years you may find the reason for the mysterious illnesses. I am not an activist-I a horse owner that does not want to find horsemeat in my kids food-some mysterious illness we cant stop! I love horses, but this is about people lives. What amazes me is the vet who is covering up all this and stating BUTE is the only dangerous drug in horsemeat-really big liars! :You wanna know whats in a horse? contact us we will show boxes of drugs, supplements, medications, vaccines, and other pesticides, linaments, washes, chemicals, feed through and otherwise that can KILL people. NO 300.00 horsemeat dinner is worth the death of a child or someone I love! So why would you not look into this issue and expose the lies and cover-ups! Steroids for horses are banned in sports for people but they can EAT them in horse meat? Really???If you want the truth about whats going on-follow the blood trail through the coverup of what goes into a horse. When a horse goes to auction its already been fed every dangerous thing it could consume that humans cannot tolerate-its like sending a loaded weapon to another country and then a company like CHEVAL wants to come kill horses to export-sure, come carry some more lethal illnesses back to your country-then they decided we will raise our own horses chemical free to eat-good idea and in the usa there is a disease known as Coggins (EIA) spreads like wildfire=one animal contracts it and all animals have to be locked down in quarateen-this is highly contagious and animals have to be destroyed and incinerated by law. Go ahead and raise large herds of protection free horses and see how fast your operation goes belly up. Why do you think in America we medicate to the hilt? As well-horse meat isnt consumed by horse owners because why would we eat the garbage out of the dumpster behind the nuclear power plant that they have to empty with a hazmat suit on-do you really think WE are that stupid? No but evidently other people ARE! Next time you wish to eat horses-just go get a to go bag from the nearest nuclear reactor and chow down! Must faster result!

[alphaa10000]

SARS-- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Severe_acute_respiratory_syndrome

[samuel5028]

This sort of issues makes people mad in the country. The curious part of the article is, these diseases are coming from other countries, then why in the hell aren't the immigrants getting vaccinated before they come to Country to stop the spread of their diseases, instead the health authorities shove the vaccines down our throats.