Probable Transmission Chains of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus and the Multiple Generations of Secondary Infection in South Korea

Authors described possible cause of MERS-CoV transmission in South Korea resulting in 185 secondary infections as of July 14, 2015. These secondary infections were attributed to three overlapping generations of cases who have contracted the virus almost exclusively in the healthcare environment. Fomite transmission may explain a significant proportion of the infections occurring in the absence of direct contact with infected cases. The analysis of publicly available data collected from multiple sources, including the media, is useful for describing the epidemic history of an infectious disease outbreak.