The role of superspreading in Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) transmission

As at 15 June 2015, a large transmission cluster of Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) was ongoing in South Korea. To examine the potential for such events, we estimated the level of heterogeneity in MERS-CoV transmission by analysing data on cluster size distributions. We found substantial potential for superspreading; even though it is likely that R0 < 1 overall, our analysis indicates that cluster sizes of over 150 cases are not unexpected for MERS-CoV infection.