A South Korean research team has developed the world's first diagnostic kit that can confirm MERS, or Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, in just 15 minutes.
 
Professor Song Dae-sub of the College of Pharmacy at Korea University and Bionote, a maker of disease diagnostics products, said Friday that they have jointly developed a kit that can confirm MERS using mucus from the nose or throat.
 
The team presented their research in the June issue of the Journal of Clinical Microbiology, published by the American Society for Microbiology. According to their paper, the kit accurately confirmed MERS in 93-point-9 percent of cases, while 100 percent accurate in detecting non-MERS cases.
 
The research team and health authorities are discussing using the kits to diagnose patients in South Korea, which currently has the largest number of MERS cases outside of the Middle East. The team has already exported the kits to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
 
Song said it’s unlikely that MERS will spread further in South Korea as long as quarantine efforts are strict, stressing that there's no need to excessively fear the disease.