Health authorities confirmed Saturday that the MERS virus in South Korea has not mutated from its original form in the Middle East, citing near identical genetic sequences.
 
The confirmation has debunked speculation that the virus afflicting South Korea had mutated to become more easily transmittable than the virus first reported in countries such as Saudi Arabia.
 
The Health and Welfare Ministry's MERS control headquarters held a briefing Saturday, releasing the results of tests conducted by the Korea National Institute of Health. 
 
The institute extracted the coronavirus from the second MERS patient to analyze the genetic sequence of the infection. Results showed that the sequence was 99-point-55 percent identical with the MERS virus (named 'JX869059') preserved at the U.S. National Institutes of Health which was taken from a Saudi Arabian patient in 2012.
 
A health official in Seoul said South Korea's climate is more favorable for the virus. He said there is a possibility of mutation during the spread, but in virological terms, the current virus is identical with the one reported in the Middle East.