Under the chairmanship of the Deputy Minister of Health and Head of the Command and Control Center (CCC), Dr. Abdulaziz bin Saeed, a meeting of some of CCC Regional Offices and its Main Headquarter at the Ministry of Health (MOH) has been held via visual communication the day before yesterday. The meeting was attended by heads of the CCC platforms and representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA), so as to follow-up the latest developments of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Corona Virus (MERS-CoV).
The meeting highlighted the necessity of taking highest levels of preparations and preventive precautions, given that there is a decrease of infection over the past months, the matter which gives the medical staff a false impression of non-occurrence of new outbreaks. Hence, this matter leads to the lack of caution in diagnosis, applying infection control standards and sending a circular to all hospitals, asking them to take caution for the time being, in order to avert such disease outbreak, which happened at a number of private and public hospitals at the same time over the past years. For this reason, all doctors, especially those in emergency sections, are requested to isolate any suspected case, according to the four definitions of the CCC.
Furthermore, MOA representatives warned that this time of the year (November to March) is the optimal time for camels breeding and transition movement, the matter which makes people more prone to infection due to close contact with camels, especially with young ones. In fact, a lot of people go to desert accompanied by their families which exposes them to infection and the incidence of primary cases (camel to human), which might contribute to the incidence of numerous secondary infections (human to human) at hospitals, thus leading to severe outbreak of infection among inpatients and medical staff.
During the meeting, the MOA clarified that respiratory secretion of twenty camels from Jeddah market has been examined, and 11 of them proved positive for the virus, given that there were some positive camels in Bisha; which means that we should be more cautious when dealing with camels and visiting their markets.
Above and beyond, doctors of Internal Medicine, Emergency and Cardiology Sections have been notified to be careful and attentive when dealing with cardiac cases which are diagnosed as only cardiac cases, not paying attention that there is pneumonia at the same time. In fact, most of MERS-CoV cases, which caused infection outbreaks in the Kingdom's hospitals, were cardiac cases that had not been diagnosed and isolated on the right time, which led to infection transmission to other patients and medical staff, as well as many deaths for this reason.
Within the same vein, the meeting underscored the need to note that the absence of fever in cardiac and renal failure cases does not necessarily exclude MERS-CoV from the diagnosis of the disease or suspicion of infection in the patient. Besides, the meeting participants underlined that they are fully prepared to answer any inquiry from the workers, citizens and residents of this country, May Allah save it from all infections and scourges, meanwhile calling upon everyone to cooperate together and exert joint efforts, in order to combat the virus.
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