Dromedaris en ‘Middle East respiratory syndrome’

• Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) is a novel coronavirus, identified in patients with respiratory symptoms in the Middle East.
• Accumulating evidence points to dromedary camels as being reservoirs.
• MERS-CoV has been isolated from dromedaries, and dromedary MERS-CoV is nearly identical to human MERS-CoV. Camel and human MERS-CoV genome sequences from the same geographic areas cluster together.
• Both on the Arabian Peninsula and in Africa high percentages of adult dromedaries are seropositive for MERS-CoV.
• Young dromedaries (≤ 2 years) are more often acutely infected than adult camels. This means that the risk of human infection may be higher in camel breeding season (spring) when more naïve camels are present.
• Antibodies appeared to be present in dromedaries as early as 1992, while the first case in humans was recognised in 2012.
• Underdiagnosis, differences in risk profile, or subtle differences in the genetic make-up of MERS-CoV may explain the absence of MERS in humans before 2012, and in Africa.

Conflict of interest and financial support: ICMJE forms provided by the authors are available online along with the full text of this article.