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MERS hits doctors, nurses hard

June 18, 2015

Medical staff account for 20% of confirmed cases

Of the 165 confirmed patients, 30 are medical staff, including five doctors, 11 nurses and 14 orderlies. (Yonhap)

By Lee Kyung-min

The Ministry of Health and Welfare said Thursday that medical staff account for nearly a fifth of confirmed Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) patients.

Of the 165 confirmed patients, 30 are medical staff, including five doctors, 11 nurses and 14 orderlies.

There are a variety of reasons why doctors and nurses failed to protect themselves from the virus. In the initial stages of the outbreak, they had no knowledge about the disease, and treated confirmed patients without wearing masks and gloves, according to ministry officials.

Of the three patients newly confirmed, Thursday, two were nurses, one working at Samsung Medical Center (SMC) and the other based at Asan Chungmu Hospital in South Chungcheong Province.

The SMC nurse was the first case of a staff member confirmed with MERS who had not worked in the emergency room there. The ministry is looking into whether she wore protective clothing or not.

“It is unclear whether she contracted the virus while taking her mask off, or whether she had worn it the whole time. We will announce the results as soon as we are able to,” a ministry official said.

Her infection is among four cases where a person has contracted the disease outside the emergency room at SMC. Of the 81 confirmed cases there, 77 came from inside the emergency room.

Including this latest patient, the SMC has confirmed two other medical staff as suffering from MERS.

A day earlier, an orderly was confirmed with the disease. He was in charge of taking patients from the emergency room to diagnostic facilities or wards.

He showed MERS symptoms including a fever from June 2, but kept working through June 10 before being confirmed, coming into contact with nearly 400 people at the hospital, according to the ministry.

An Asan Chungmu Hospital nurse was infected after treating a confirmed patient, a police officer working at Pyeongtaek Police Station, who was hospitalized there from June 5 to 9.

Five nurses at the hospital are now suspected of being infected, and are undergoing confirmation testing.

The ministry said the continued spread is due to the SMC not following ministry guidelines to ensure medical staff wore protective equipment.

According to the guidelines, all workers treating confirmed patients are required to wear level D equipment including an N95 mask, goggles, gloves, socks and a sterilization suit.

“We ordered the SMC to impose the guidelines as of Wednesday,” a ministry official said.

The SMC said they ordered radiology technicians to wear face masks and gloves to prevent possible infection.

“We admit that we fell short of following the ministry guidelines. As of Wednesday, we will have all of our workers fully equipped with the necessary gear while on duty,” an SMC official said.

Meanwhile, the ministry is collecting the information of all inpatients and outpatients who were treated at SMC.

Total deaths now stand at 23 with 6,729 people in quarantine after possible contact with patients confirmed to have the disease.