Looking like this result could not be confirmed
by external testing.
June 20th
The case, a 53-year old male (53M) returned to Dhaka, Bangladesh on 4-June from New York (the United States of America), via Abu Dhabi (United Arab Emirates). He became symptomatic on 6-June and was hospitalized 9-June.
Director of the Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR), Prof. Mahmudur Rahman, speculated that 53M was likely to have contacted MERS-CoV in the UAE. It's not clear whether he transited through the Abu Dhabi airport (apparently he was at the airport for 3-hours, h/t @influenza_bio; seems like a very unlucky acquisition then[4]), or stayed there for some time.
If new Bangladesh #MERS patient truly contracted #MERS in Abu Dhabi airport or on an airplane, this suggests a spreader was also traveling.It's also not clear how long he stayed the the USA for. The WHO have been informed, according to reports.
� A biologist (@influenza_bio) June 15, 2014
A 2-day incubation period is a bit on the short side for MERS-CoV though. Eagerly awaiting the WHO DON on this case.
[UPDATE] It looks like this sample could not be repeated. If I read any further announcements I'll post them here buit for now it appears that the two samples may have been false positive results. How that could happen I'm really not able to imagine. But we'd need to know more about the testing to answer that.
Sources...
- FluTrackers thread
http://www.flutrackers.com/forum/showthread.php?p=537546#post537546 - Treyfish's H5N1 pandemic information news blog
http://swineflumagazine.blogspot.com.au/2014/06/more-on-bangladesh.html - The Daily Star
http://www.thedailystar.net/mers-detected-first-time-in-bangladesh-28635 - Channel NewsAsia
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/health/bangladesh-reports-first/1162024.html
