Across Asia, masks have lost their stigma to become an everyday sight in the street or on the subway, despite some experts believing they do little more than provide psychological reassurance against diseases such as MERS, which has already left 24 people dead in South Korea.
The virus, which arrived in South Korea with a businessman who had been travelling in the Middle East, has sparked a rush of orders at a small Japanese mask-maker, similar to that in the 2002-2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak in China.
Thailand on June 18 said a 75-year-old man from Oman was confirmed to have MERS in Southeast Asia's first case of the virus since an outbreak in South Korea that has killed 24 people.
