German Researchers to Probe Camel Link to New Coronavirus

[Shiloh]

Source: http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2013/04/german-researchers-to-probe-came.html

German Researchers to Probe Camel Link to New Coronavirus
by Martin Enserink on 4 April 2013, 11:30 AM

On 26 March, a 73-year-old man from Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, died at the Klinikum Schwabing, a hospital in Munich. He was the 11th known fatality related to infection with the novel coronavirus (nCoV), a pathogen that was first reported in September 2012 and is attracting substantial interest from researchers. Overall, officials have reported 17 cases of nCoV infection.

Clemens Wendtner, a professor of medicine and assistant medical director at the University of Cologne, is a physician at the Munich hospital. ScienceInsider asked Wendtner how the case was handled and why he thinks the patient may have been infected by one of his racing camels. Questions and answers have been edited for brevity and clarity...

 

[Emily]

Re: German Researchers to Probe Camel Link to New Coronavirus

It's certainly a worthwhile trail to follow.

C.W.: So far, it's only circumstantial evidence. The patient owned racing camels. One of them got ill and was very weak; the patient was in close contact with that camel, and on the evening the camel got very sick, the patient developed flulike symptoms. Three days later, he was in a medical unit in Abu Dhabi. There is another family member who also had close contact with the camel, he also got ill, but we could not follow up with that gentleman.