Table 1. Cohorts used in study of specificity and sensitivity of assays for MERS-CoV*.

Cohort	Country	Sample source	Infection	No. samples	Postdiagnosis range
A	The Netherlands	Healthy blood donors (negative cohort)	NA	50	NA
B	The Netherlands	Non-CoV respiratory infections†	Adenovirus	5	2–4 w
			Bocavirus	2	2–4 w
			Enterovirus	2	2–4 w
			HMPV	9	2–4 w
			Influenza A	13	2–4 w
			Influenza B	6	2–4 w
			Rhinovirus	9	2–4 w
			RSV	9	2–4 w
			PIV-1	4	2–4 w
			PIV-3	4	2–4 w
			Mycoplasma pneumoniae	1	2–4 w
			CMV	9	2–4 w
			EBV	12	2–4 w
C	The Netherlands	Persons with recent CoV infections†	α-CoV HCoV-229E	19	2 w–1 y
			α-CoV HCoV-NL63	18	2 w–1 y
			β-CoV HCoV-OC43	23	2 w–1 y
D1	Qatar	S1-microarray positive persons with camel contact	NA	19	NA
D2		S1-microarray negative persons with camel contact	NA	18	NA
E	The Netherlands	RT-PCR confirmed MERS case-patients‡	Acute‡	21	1–14 d
F			Convalescent‡	7	15–228 d
G	South Korea	RT-PCR confirmed MERS case-patients	Mild infection§	17	6–12 mo
H			Severe infection¶	15	6–12 mo

*Cohorts A–C were established to test assay specificity; cohorts D–H were established to test assay sensitivity. CoV, coronavirus; CMV, Cytomegalovirus; EBV, Epstein-Barr virus; HCoV, human coronavirus; HMPV, human metapneumovirus; MERS, Middle East respiratory syndrome; mo, month; NA, not applicable; PIV, parainfluenza virus; RSV, respiratory syncytial virus. 
†Cross-reactivity.
‡Samples taken from 2 case-patients at different time points.
§Samples taken from 6 case-patients at different time points.
¶Samples taken from 5 case-patients at different time points.