The number of Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) cases in the U.S. is going to stay at two for now.

According to Reuters, two Orlando, Fla. health care workers tested negative for MERS after they showed potential symptoms following close contact with a patient. A Saudi Arabian man was visiting family in Orlando when he came down with MERS and he is the second confirmed case in the U.S.

The World Health Organization (WHO) recently announced MERS is not a global emergency because it can apparently only be transferred in close human contact. The fact that these two health care workers did not catch MERS despite treating someone with a confirmed case is a promising sign.

The Orlando hospital was also monitoring 20 health care workers who may have been at risk, but those tests have also been negative. Along with a man in Indiana, both U.S. cases of MERS have involved health care workers, which WHO identified as having the highest risk of contracting the virus.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Thomas Frieden praised Community Hospital in Indiana for its response to the MERS patient, the Washington Post reported. The hospital followed up with everyone on the man's flights to London and to Chicago, then with everyone on the bus to Indiana. The hospital also put about 50 workers in isolation until they were confirmed to not have MERS.

BBC News reported the CDC said the risk to the U.S. general public is "very low" and the recent negative tests of the Orlando health care workers is encouraging.

WHO said MERS has infected a total of 536 people, killing 145, and a vast majority of cases are in Saudi Arabia, where it originated. WHO is not ready to sound the alarm, like with SARS, a similar virus that killed more than 800 people worldwide.

MERS is about two years old and likely began with bats, who infected camels, who then passed the virus to humans.

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