As the MERS virus took hold in the Middle East in recent months, killing more than 140 people, U.S. health officials had hoped the contagious illness would not land on American shores.

 

However, recently a man in Indiana fell ill with the disease. And now a second U.S. case of MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome) has now been confirmed in a man in an Orlando hospital. What’s more, two health workers exposed to the patient have begun showing symptoms, and one of them has been hospitalized, officials said.

 

Is it time to worry? One of the world’s top MERS experts tells Newsmax Health it is likely there will be more American victims, but he says a major outbreak here is improbable.

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“We haven’t seen any spread from household-to-household or within the community, so that’s very good news,” said Stanley Perlman, M.D., professor of microbiology and pediatrics at the University of Iowa. “As I understand it, both patients contracted the virus after direct contact in healthcare settings with patients who were very sick with it. This shows that the MERS virus does not spread easily.”
 

It appears that MERS does not spread through casual contact. “Unlike the flu virus, which lives in the nose, the virus that causes MERS lives deep in the lungs, so you would have to be in contact with someone who is very sick and has a deep, deep cough,” Dr. Perlman said.

 

For the virus to cause an epidemic, it would likely have to mutate and become able to live in the nose or upper airways, he said. So far, there is no sign of that happening.  

 

Dr. Perlman has studied coronaviruses, which include MERS, for more than 30 years. He and his team recently created the first mouse model of MERS, which they are using to test potential treatments and vaccines. He returned recently from Saudi Arabia, where he addressed a global meeting focusing on MERS.
 

“The only people in the U.S. who should be concerned about MERS are those who are likely to come into contact with people who have been to Saudi Arabia and appear ill,” Dr. Perlman said. “In that case you would want to be cautious,”

The early signs of MERS are a flu-like fever and a cough, which leads to shortness of breath. In severe cases, the illness progresses to pneumonia and death.

As of this week, 538 confirmed cases had been reported to the World Health Organization, with 145 having been fatal. The vast majority, 450 cases, have been in Saudi Arabia, where the disease surfaced in March.

 

After the first American patient became ill, health officials tested more than 500 people who came in contact with him on plane flights, on a bus trip, in the hospital, or elsewhere. None tested positive for the virus.

 

A similar effort to trace all contacts is underway in Florida, and the Centers for Disease Control has asked doctors throughout the country to be “vigilant” about new cases.

 

The CDC has said it is not considering issuing travel warnings regarding Saudi Arabia.

 

“People in Saudi Arabia have taken to wearing face masks when they walk in the street in hopes of preventing the virus, but they don’t need to do that,” said Dr. Perlman. “I hope they don’t start doing that in Florida because it isn’t warranted.”