Blog #5:Additional MERS Cases Raise Concerns Over Saudi Arabian Pilgrimage

            The Middle East Respiratory Syndrom-Coronavirus becomes popular when the hajj season in Saudi Arabia comes closer. The Ministry of health (MOH) is thinking and acting on efforts they are making to keep millions of religious people traveling from getting this illness. This annual pilgrimage where religious people go on a journey, happening from October 13^th to October 18^th, are where millions of pilgrims will congregate in Mecca and Medina for prayer and worship. The people are concerned that the virus will affect children and elderly people even though there were no known cases of this virus from the previous years of hajj.  There have been new cases of this virus reported the Ministry of health and they are all from the Riyadh region in September. The hajj is only a week away and the Ministry of health has to prepare for the worst because this virus could spread and become deadly to many people. The Ministry of health is warning people who are children and elderly to not join in the pilgrimage at all to protect them from the virus all together. These pilgrims may possibly carry this disease back to their hometowns, possibly making this virus go global. These pilgrims will be wearing masks when they travel and visiting the Middle East but other than that they cant put a restriction on the pilgrims not traveling.

            An Egyptian virologist named Dr. Ali Mohamed Zaki in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia reported the first sighting of this Middle East Respiratory Syndrom-Coronavirus on September 24, 2012. This finding was found in a 60 year old mans lungs with acute pneumonia (lung inflammation) and acute renal failure (relating to the kidneys). They have figured out a vaccination for this virus but they are currently awaiting clinical trials to make sure they work effectively. There have been only 136 cases of this virus reported in Saudi Arabia so it seems to be a very rare disease. The most recent report stated that there have been 46 deaths from this virus. A case was also found in the United Kingdom because a man had traveled to the Middle East and Pakistan, making it the 10^th case globally. Also, this disease was confirmed to be found in France because a man had recently traveled to Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Hopefully they can find a complete cure to this virus because with it being deadly it sounds too dangerous for people to keep getting and not being able to do anything about the systems they end u having.

Kaley Stapleton

October 7, 2013

10:40pm

http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1112967506/saudi-arabia-confirms-six-new-cases-mers-coronavirus-100613/