South Korea’s burgeoning MERS outbreak should be a reminder to the world that a virus some may have written off can trigger significant disease and major disruption, a World Health Organization expert says. The outbreak in that country has now infected 126 people, 11 of whom have died. And it may be a while yet before South Korea’s health officials manage to stop spread of the virus, said Peter Ben […]

MERS-CoV, short for Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus, first surfaced in Saudi Arabia in spring 2012. As of Wednesday, 571 cases of MERS have been confirmed in 18 countries, according to the World Health Organization. Two of those cases were in the United States. There have been 171 deaths worldwide. Here are five things you should know about MERS: It’s a coronavirus MERS is in the same family of viruses […]