As of Tuesday morning, the South Korean authorities had confirmed at least 95 MERS cases and were monitoring more than 2,500 people under quarantine for symptoms. At least seven patients have died. 
 
 So many patients, including those in rural towns, seek medical care at large hospitals that securing a bed in a mega-hospital in Seoul, the capital, for a relative or friend has become a test of a person’s networking ability. Patients often visit small hospitals to get a referral to a bigger hospital. 
 
 The two hospitals where the vast majority of MERS cases have occurred were among the biggest in their cities. 
 
 “Many people want to check into famous hospitals, some even waiting in their emergency rooms until a bed gets available,” said Kim Woo-joo, head of the Korean Society of Infectious Diseases, who is leading the government’s epidemiological study of the MERS outbreak. “In big hospitals, we see bottlenecks. This is a very Korean thing, and I think this is not a good situation when we have a new contagious virus breaking out.” 
 
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 In many ways South Korea is one of the world’s most technologically advanced countries, where most of the population is connected to the Internet and nearly everyone has a smartphone. But within a matter of days, it has also become known for the largest caseload of MERS outside of Saudi Arabia, where the disease first emerged in 2012. 
 
 Researchers have traced MERS to a virus that is believed to have jumped from camels to humans. The virus can be spread by breathing the same air as an infected and coughing person in proximity. It causes high fevers and pneumonia-like symptoms, and there is no cure. 
 
 The hospital odyssey of the first infected patient, known as the index case, began after May 11, when he developed a fever and began coughing. He visited a clinic in his hometown Asan, south of Seoul, on May 12, 14 and 15. Perplexed doctors, not knowing he had even visited Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in early May, sent him to a bigger hospital, St. Mary’s, in Pyeongtaek, 37 miles south of Seoul. 
 
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 With no improvement, he went to Seoul to seek better medical care, visiting a relatively small hospital there on May 17, when X-rays suggested pneumonia. The next day he was referred to the Samsung Medical Center in Seoul, one of the largest in South Korea, where doctors suspected he had MERS, learned of his Middle East visit and isolated him. The correct diagnosis was confirmed on May 20. 
 
 Mr. Kim said the crowded conditions at St. Mary’s had been ideal for the virus to spread. So far, 37 St. Mary’s patients have been confirmed as having caught the virus — nearly 40 percent of the known total. 
 
 “It must have been a period when the virus was most active in him and he was coughing out a lot of virus droplets,” Mr. Kim said. 
 
 One of the St. Mary’s patients infected by the index case later checked into the emergency ward of the Samsung hospital in Seoul, infecting at least 35 people there. Nearly 700 people who were at the emergency ward have been quarantined. 
 
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 There has been no sign of a panic among the wider public. But fears of the virus have led to the closings of nearly 2,000 kindergartens and schools and the cancellation of concerts and religious and social gatherings. Sales of face masks and hand sanitizer have soared. Baseball stadium attendance has plummeted. 
 
 In a sign of widening fear in Asia, the authorities in Hong Kong raised their three-stage response level on Monday from “alert” to “serious,” which means ports of entry will exert tighter arrival controls. The Hong Kong Center for Health Protection posted an advisory about the raised response on its website, urging people to “avoid unnecessary travel” to South Korea. 
 
 The W.H.O. appeared to be less concerned, saying that it was not advising special actions at ports and airports in South Korea or travel or trade restrictions, “given the lack of evidence of sustained human-to-human transmission in the community.” 
 
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 Alison Clements-Hunt, a spokeswoman for the health organization, said that the virus pattern found in South Korea was in line with those monitored elsewhere. The testing on a virus sample in South Korea “shows nothing alarming in terms of mutations and change in what would be the transmissibility of the virus.” 
 
 Nonetheless, she said the organization was sending a team of experts to South Korea. She also said frequent visits to patients at hospitals in some Asian cultures were “something that may need to be looked at in the light of MERS.” 
 
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 Some experts have faulted the South Korean government for the way it initially handled information on the outbreak. None of the hospitals where patients were infected had been alerted about the possibility of MERS. 
 
 “Doctors were diagnosing the patients without knowing anything about MERS,” said Jee Sun-ha, a professor of public health at Yonsei University in Seoul. “Once the authorities detected the first case, they should have taken more aggressive steps, revealing the names of the hospitals the patients had visited and trying as much as possible to localize the outbreak.” 
 
 It was only Sunday that the government revealed the names of all 24 hospitals the confirmed cases had visited — two and a half weeks after the first case was discovered. They have since added five more to the list. 
 
 The government said it had been reluctant to make the names public, fearing possible panic in the neighborhoods around the hospitals. After their names were released, some of the hospitals reported a plunge in the number of outpatients and even closed down temporarily. 
 
 But Choi Chang-woo, head of the civic group Citizens’ Solidarity for Safe Society, said that the government’s “monopoly on information,” which he said was rooted in South Korea’s authoritarian past, was partly to protect the business interests of big hospitals and keep people ignorant about mistakes. 
 
 “They haven’t learned from the Sewol disaster,” Mr. Choi said, referring to the hundreds of deaths in the sinking of the Sewol ferry in April last year, often attributed to the government’s fumbled rescue. “This is what you get when your government’s top priority is not the safety of the people.” 
 
 President Park Geun-hye’s weekly approval rating dropped six percentage points to 34 percent last week in the aftermath of the MERS outbreak, according to a survey released on Friday by Gallup Korea. On Monday, Ms. Park vowed an “all-out national response.” 
 
 Efforts included exploiting South Korea’s advanced cellphone network, tracing the signals of people who had defied quarantine in order to find them. 
 
 “Now the government is belatedly trying to mend the fence after the cow had already been stolen,” Mr. Choi said. ||||| SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea believes its MERS virus outbreak may have peaked, and experts say the next several days will be critical to determining whether the government's belated efforts have successfully stymied a disease that has killed seven people and infected nearly 100 in the country. 
 
 Visitors wear mask as a precaution against the MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, virus as they arrive at Incheon International Airport in Incheon. South Korea, Tuesday, June 9, 2015. South Korea... (Associated Press) 
 
 A visitor wears a mask as a precaution against the MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, virus as she arrives at Incheon International Airport in Incheon. South Korea, Tuesday, June 9, 2015. South Korea... (Associated Press) 
 
 A foreign tourist, center, wears a mask as a precaution against Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) as she takes pictures with her smartphone at the Myeongdong, one of the main shopping districts,... (Associated Press) 
 
 Visitors wear mask as a precaution against the MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, virus as they arrive at Incheon International Airport in Incheon. South Korea, Tuesday, June 9, 2015. South Korea... (Associated Press) 
 
 Foreign visitors wear mask as a precaution against the MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, virus as they arrive at Incheon International Airport in Incheon. South Korea, Tuesday, June 9, 2015. South... (Associated Press) 
 
 South Korean elementary school students wear masks as a precaution against the MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, virus as they sanitize their hands to protect against possible MERS virus at an elementary... (Associated Press) 
 
 Foreign visitors wear mask as a precaution against the MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, virus as they arrive at Incheon International Airport in Incheon. South Korea, Tuesday, June 9, 2015. South... (Associated Press) 
 
 South Korean elementary school students wear masks as a precaution against the MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, virus as they attend a lesson at an elementary school in Busan, South Korea, Tuesday,... (Associated Press) 
 
 The biggest outbreak of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome outside the region where it was first seen in 2012 was introduced to South Korea last month by a 68-year-old man who had traveled to Saudi Arabia and other nearby countries. 
 
 When he got sick after his return to South Korea, he visited several hospitals and clinics, where dozens of other patients and hospital workers were infected before officials found he had MERS. Gradually, the government began isolating victims and quarantining those who'd had contact with them. 
 
 There has been widespread fear here of the poorly understood disease, which has no vaccine and as much as a 40 percent mortality rate. There also had been growing criticism over failures by health workers and the government to initially recognize and quickly contain the disease. 
 
 Nearly 3,000 people have been placed in isolation and 2,200 schools closed in South Korea. Although MERS spreads through close contact with sick people, not through the air, many people here have avoided going to crowded places like baseball parks and movie theaters. Travel agencies report a sharp increase in the number of foreigners canceling plans to visit South Korea. 
 
 The outbreak, however, has so far been contained in hospitals and there's no evidence, the U.N. health agency says, of "sustained transmission in the community." 
 
 Authorities say the first MERS patient didn't reveal his Saudi Arabia trip to doctors until he arrived at the Seoul-based Samsung Medical Center after being treated at three other hospitals, including St. Mary's Hospital in Pyeongtaek, south of Seoul. Samsung and St. Mary's have seen most of the country's infections. 
 
 The initial patient's wife, who was the country's second MERS case and is now out of the hospital, recently told a local TV station that her husband didn't intend to hide information about his travels, but simply had trouble talking to doctors because of his high fever. 
 
 Because the virus' incubation period is estimated at five to six days on average, extending up to about two weeks, experts believe there won't be any more cases directly infected by the first patient. The Health Ministry said that no more MERS cases have originated from St. Mary's Hospital. 
 
 There are still concerns about Samsung Medical Center, where at least 37 people have been infected, although fewer cases have been reported there in recent days. 
 
 The initial patient was eventually isolated on May 20 after doctors at Samsung, where the man ended up, suspected he had MERS and alerted the government, which moved him to a government-run facility. But a week later, another so-called "super-spreader" — a man who'd been infected by the initial patient at St. Mary's Hospital — checked into an overcrowded Samsung Medical Center, where he was forced to stay for several days in the emergency room. He spread the disease among doctors, visitors and other patients there, according to health officials. 
 
 The maximum incubation period for those infected by the second "super-spreader" ends around this Friday, experts said, which raises hopes that the outbreak could weaken soon. 
 
 "I cautiously predict (MERS) will peak today" and be stabilized in the next few days, Health Minister Moon Hyung-pyo told lawmakers Monday. 
 
 The prospects for the virus weakening this week depend on whether there are many people who have evaded government quarantine measures and infected other people in various places, said Jacob Lee, an infectious disease expert at Kangnam Sacred Heart Hospital in Seoul. 
 
 World Health Organization experts arrived in South Korea on Monday to investigate the outbreak. 
 
 There are concerns that South Korea's economy could suffer as tourism and business travel drop because of MERS fears. 
 
 Hong Kong has issued a red travel warning for South Korea, the second highest of three levels, and advised residents against unnecessary travel there. Hong Kong has been hypersensitive to infectious diseases since the outbreak of SARS in 2003, which killed hundreds of people. 
 
 MERS has mostly been centered in Saudi Arabia. It belongs to the family of coronaviruses that includes the common cold and SARS, and can cause fever, breathing problems, pneumonia and kidney failure. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Associated Press writer Kelvin K. Chan in Hong Kong contributed to this report. ||||| CLOSE Liz Szabo and Taylor Maycan of USA TODAY discuss the latest developments in the MERS outbreak in South Korea. Liz Szabo, Taylor Maycan, Jasper Colt 
 
 A hospital worker takes supplies to a quarantine tent for people possibly infected with the MERS virus at Seoul National University Hospital on June 2, 2015, in Seoul. The Ministry of Health and Welfare of South Korea confirmed two deaths from Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) on June 2, 2015. It reported six new cases of MERS, raising the number of confirmed local patients to 25. The first case was confirmed May 20. (Photo: Chung Sung-Jun, Getty Images) 
 
 A MERS outbreak in South Korea — the largest outside Saudi Arabia, where the disease first emerged in 2012 — is likely to grow, the World Health Organization said Tuesday. 
 
 MERS, or Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, has infected at least 25 people in South Korea and killed two, according to the World Health Organization. 
 
 Doctors have diagnosed five new cases not yet confirmed by the WHO, bringing the total to 30 cases, said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, who is in contact with South Korean doctors who are treating the patients. 
 
 South Korean officials have isolated 680 people to limit the spread of the disease, which spreads when sick people cough. 
 
 There have been at least 1,154 lab-confirmed cases of MERS worldwide since 2012, along with 431 deaths — a mortality rate of 37%. 
 
 MERS belongs to the same family of viruses as SARS, or Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, which was identified in 2003. Symptoms include fever, cough and shortness of breath, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 
 
 The first MERS case in South Korea, confirmed May 20, was in a 68-year-old man who had traveled to four Middle Eastern countries. He developed symptoms May 11 and sought care at two outpatient clinics and two hospitals, the WHO said. 
 
 Doctors didn't isolate the man because he didn't report exposure to MERS, the WHO said. He was exposed to a number of medical staff and hospital patients, as well as their family members and visitors. Health officials are seeking more information about how he was exposed during his Middle Eastern travels, the WHO said. 
 
 The patient infected some patients in the same room, as well as others on the same ward of the hospitals. Some patients became infected after being exposed to the man for as little as five minutes, the WHO said. 
 
 Other patients may have spread the virus at other hospitals before they were diagnosed. 
 
 The first MERS patient in South Korea shared a hospital ward with a 35-year-old man whose son had tuberculosis and who was taking medication to prevent infection. That man developed a fever after being discharged. He visited two hospitals and was given antibiotics by staff who probably assumed his symptoms were caused by tuberculosis, said Daniel Lucey, an adjunct professor of microbiology and immunology at Georgetown University Medical Center. That man then visited the hospital again, where he was isolated. 
 
 Another man infected with MERS in South Korea traveled to China on May 26, against his doctor's orders, and was diagnosed a hospital in that country three days later. The man had symptoms of MERS during his travel, the WHO said. 
 
 South Korea's Ministry of Health confirmed that there have been three generations of MERS spread — from the initial patient to a second patient and then to a third patient with no contact with the original patient. 
 
 Given how many people were exposed, "further cases can be expected," the WHO said in a statement. People are more likely to spread the disease when they are very sick and coughing more, Osterholm said. 
 
 The first MERS case in the United States, a health professional who had traveled to Saudi Arabia, was diagnosed in 2014, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 
 
 Doctors have long known that coronaviruses such as MERS spread easily in hospitals, Osterholm said. Hospitals helped to spread the SARS outbreak in Toronto in 2003, as sick patients waited in crowded emergency departments, Osterholm said. 
 
 The current South Korean outbreak underscores the need to develop a vaccine against MERS, said Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. 
 
 There's a lot that doctors don't know about coronaviruses, such as why some people appear so much more contagious than others. During the 2003 SARS outbreak, doctors called highly infectious people "super spreaders" because they infected dozens of people. Other patients, however, never infect anyone. "These people may have more of the virus, or their coughs may be more efficient at spreading it," Osterholm said. 
 
 Osterholm notes that it's difficult to tell if the South Korean outbreak is spreading any more quickly than usual. In past outbreaks in Saudi Arabia, world health officials often received information long after patients had been treated. 
 
 South Korean officials have been quick to notify international authorities of new developments, allowing people to follow the outbreak "in real time," Osterholm said. 
 
 "There is a lot more transparency here than on the Arabian peninsula," Osterholm said. 
 
 Because South Korea has an advanced medical system, it is better positioned to contain the MERS outbreak than developing nations, Osterholm said. 
 
 "The fact that MERS has spread around the world is not surprising," Osterholm said. "The question is, 'Where is it going to spread to next?' It could very easily come to America. Very easily. Any flight could contain someone who was infected in the Middle East." 
 
 Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1M2IfGu ||||| 2015/06/09 11:38 
 
 SEJONG, June 9 (Yonhap) -- South Korea confirmed another death from Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and reported eight new cases Tuesday, raising the number of infections to 95. 
 
 The latest fatality, the seventh since the country first reported the outbreak on May 20, was a 68-year-old woman who had already been suffering from chronic heart conditions, according to the Ministry of Health and Welfare. 
 
 She was hospitalized at Seoul's Samsung Medical Center on May 27-28, during which she came in close contact with a MERS patient. 
 
 The total number of people diagnosed with the disease came to 95 as the country confirmed eight new cases. 
 
 All eight new patients were infected after coming in close contact with those previously diagnosed at five hospitals, including Asan Medical Center, one of the largest hospitals in the capital. 
 
 As of Tuesday morning, 2,892 people, including family members of those diagnosed, were in isolation for possible infection from coming into close contact with a MERS patient, according to the ministry. 
 
 The health ministry said it will fully fund the cost of diagnosis and treatment for those who have contracted the disease, as well as those in quarantine as suspected cases. 
 
 The ministry again warned against groundless fears, noting nearly two-thirds of those diagnosed with the disease had existing health conditions while all of those who have died from the disease had existing illnesses or other health problems. 
 
 Two people diagnosed with the disease have been released after making complete recoveries. 
 
 The number will soon reach three as another patient was set to be discharged from the hospital later in the day, the ministry said. 
 
 So far, all infections have occurred at hospitals where at least one MERS patient had visited or stayed for treatment -- the reason the government believes the disease can still be contained. 
 
 Keiji Fukuda (L), an assistant director-general of the World Health Organization who is leading a delegation of medical experts to South Korea, speaks during the first meeting of a joint response team with South Korean officials at the government complex in Sejong, South Korea on June 9, 2015. (Yonhap) 
 
 To help prevent the disease from spreading further, the government has released the names of all hospitals affected by the disease, which stood at 29 as of late Monday. 
 
 Government officials said the number of new infections, along with the number of patients, may begin to dwindle this week. 
 
 "The government has decided to switch to an all-out response system as if it was seeking to eliminate the disease this very week," acting Prime Minister Choi Kyung-hwan said in a meeting with officials over the outbreak, adding he will daily attend the emergency meetings until the disease is eliminated. 
 
 "This week may be very crucial to overcoming MERS. The government will mobilize all available resources and necessary budget to help eradicate the disease at the earliest date possible," said Choi, who is also the country's finance minister. 
 
 MERS is a viral respiratory illness that was first reported in Saudi Arabia in 2012. The disease had a very high fatality rate of over 40 percent before the outbreak in South Korea, according to the health ministry. Currently, the disease has a fatality rate of around 8 percent here. 
 
 Still, health officials here are struggling to find out the reasons for what they have called the unusually fast and wide spreading of the disease, which had only some 1,100 confirmed cases throughout the world before the outbreak here. 
 
 With 95 confirmed cases, South Korea now has the second-largest number of people diagnosed with the disease after Saudi Arabia, which has reported over 1,000 cases since it reported the world's first case in 2012. 
 
 A team of medical experts from the World Health Organization (WHO) was here to help explain the reason. 
 
 The experts were set to form a joint response team with officials here to find any factors driving the outbreak, according to WHO Director-General Margaret Chan. 
 
 In a recent interview with Yonhap, Chan noted the country's traditional culture of family members caring for their loved ones in hospitals or at home may have contributed to the fast spread of MERS here. 
 
 bdk@yna.co.kr 
 
 (END)
– When a 68-year-old man visited a clinic in Asan, South Korea, on May 12, and again two and three days later, doctors were stumped by his coughing and wheezing. He was referred to a larger hospital in Pyeongtaek, then a smaller one in Seoul before X-rays on May 17 suggested he had pneumonia, reports the New York Times. Still, he was referred once more to one of the country's largest hospitals, the Samsung Medical Center in Seoul. There, doctors learned he hadn't just visited Bahrain on a recent trip as he had previously disclosed, but also the UAE and Saudi Arabia, the Wall Street Journal reports. (The patient's wife says he had trouble communicating with a high fever.) A test confirmed on May 20 he had the highly contagious MERS virus. Since then, 37 people at the Pyeongtaek hospital have tested positive. "It must have been a period when the virus was most active in him and he was coughing out a lot of virus droplets," a doctor says of the man considered the first patient in South Korea's outbreak. One of the sick from Pyeongtaek spent days in the Samsung Medical Center's ER, where another 35 were infected. South Korea has so far identified 95 total cases at 29 hospitals, including eight new cases today, reports Yonhap News. Seven have died, though all had preexisting health issues. Almost 3,000 are under quarantine, including 700 who were in the crowded Samsung Medical Center ER when the carrier arrived, while 2,200 schools have been closed, the AP reports. Authorities, however, say the virus may have peaked. Its incubation period—between five and 14 days—for the first patient has ended, meaning no other cases should arise in connection with that patient. The incubation period for the other carriers ends around Friday. "This week may be very crucial to overcoming MERS," the prime minister says. "The government will mobilize all available resources and necessary budget to help eradicate the disease."