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WHO strongly advises S.Korea to ban all MERS suspects' overseas travel

Xinhua, June 13, 2015 Adjust font size:

The World Health Organization (WHO) on Saturday strongly advised South Korea to ban all people suspected of being infected with the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) or having contact with the MERS infectees from going abroad.

Keiji Fukuda, assistant director-general for health security at the WHO, recommended it in the administrative city of Sejong during the televised press conference after ending a five-day epidemiological study of the MERS spread in South Korea.

The country's MERS infections increased to 138 Saturday as 12 more cases were discovered. One more death was reported, bringing the total death toll to 14 and the fatality rate to 10.1 percent. South Korea became the world's most MERS-contagious outside of the Middle East.

The 16-member joint mission comprising experts from the WHO and South Korea, co-headed by Fukuda and Lee Jong-koo, chief of JW LEE Center for Global Medicine under Seoul National University College of Medicine, staged the joint study of confirmed cases and infection control for five days from Tuesday.

Fukuda urged South Korea to completely figure out who had contact with the MERS infectees, to quarantine and monitor all the potential carriers of the corona virus, and to completely carry out infection prevention and control in all medical facilities.

The WHO official stressed that whoever had contact with the infectees and all potential carriers should not travel, especially should not be allowed international travels during the incubation period, adding that South Korea has established a system to trace, quarantine and monitor the potential carriers. Endi