Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus


The Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV), or EMC/2012 (HCoV-EMC/2012), is a novel positive-sense, single-stranded RNA virus of the genus Betacoronavirus.
Initially called novel coronavirus 2012 or simply novel coronavirus, it was first reported in 2012 after genome sequencing of a virus isolated from sputum samples from a person who fell ill in a 2012 outbreak of a new flu.