Five admitted to hospital with SARS-like illness in Denmark

A SARS-like illness that appears to have started in the Middle East appears to have spread to Denmark. Five patients have been admitted to hospital.

A man in London has already died from the illness after a trip to Saudi Arabia. He has since died from the virus. The disease is causing concern at the World Health Organization. The patient in London fell ill on September 3 during a trip to Saudi Arabia. On the fourth day of his hospitalization he was admitted to the ICU. He was airlifted to London on September 11 and underwent lab testing. In Denmark five people are being treated for symptoms of the infection. They have been admitted to Odense University Hospital. It is believed that the incubation period of the novel virus is five to ten days. The virus is like SARS but it is a novel coronavirus. At this time researchers do not know how it is spread. A man in Saudi Arabia died earlier this year from the same virus that the man in London died from. The coronavirus causes the common cold but in some strains is much more dangerous. The area where the virus was first identified is a location that Muslims travel to for the Haj pilgrimage. There are currently 28,400 pilgrims in the area from Malaysia. They are scheduled to finish the journey on November 1.